An application to save playing fields by making them a town green has been rejected.

At a meeting of Harrow Borough Council’s licensing panel, councillors rejected the application to make the Whitchuch Playing Fields, in Wemborough Road, Stanmore, an official green.

The application was refused after an independent inspector’s report found the applicant Melanie Lewis, who lives next to the fields, could not satisfy the criteria to award the area town green status.

The future of the 25-acre site has been in doubt since the council's previous Labour administration last year gave its backing to the Whitchurch Consortium to build a new sports complex and leisure facility on the site.

Opposition from neighbours led to the town green application, which if successful would have prevented the development.