Parents, teachers and governors at Greystone Community Primary School are opposing Vodafone's plan to place a 47ft high '3G' mast next to the entrance to Morrisons on Harrogate Road.

The closing date for objections is today, with the application due to be decided by the head of planning services at Harrogate Council on December 15, in consultation with the chairman of the council's planning committee.

Audrey Blackburn, chairman of governors at Greystone School, said: "Our greatest priority is our children and we can't afford to use them as guinea pigs until we find out that these things are positively harmful."

She said the school was bitterly disappointed not to have been consulted about the plan.

"We find it unbelievable that they could think it's not applicable when it would be such a short distance from the school," Mrs Blackburn said.

Facebook group

Objectors have secured more than 400 petition signatures and set up a group on social networking website Facebook in opposition to the proposal, which has attracted 106 users.

Alison Lewis, whose eldest child created the Internet group, has two children at Greystone, and lives 60 metres from the school.

"I am extremely concerned about this proposal, because of the health concerns associated with masts and because my youngest child has already fought a two-year battle with leukaemia," she said.

"If this mast is built, I will have to try to relocate my family and remove my children from their school.

"I couldn't bear the thought of them being under that risk. I just want it stopped."

'Improve coverage'

Dr Rob Matthews from Vodafone said the mast was required to improve 3G coverage to customers in the area.

He has apologised to Greystone School for not including it in the consultation process.

"We accept that as part of the pre-application consultation, the local school would have been expected to be included," he said.

"We apologise that this did not happen and we have written to the school asking if they have any outstanding issues that they would like addressed."

Radiation guidance

A Harrogate Council spokesman has confirmed that council guidance given in the Stewart Report says masts shouldn't be positioned too close to schools.

Dr Matthews said Vodafone's "base stations" meet with international guidelines on radiation, with typical exposures many hundreds, if not thousands, of times below the guideline amounts.

Harrogate Borough Council officers are expected to recommend refusal of the application on aesthetic grounds.

For the full story, see this week's Ripon Gazette.