THE million-pound refurbishment of a hall in Hook has been put on hold amid concerns about the cost.

At the annual village meeting, residents said they did not have enough information to back a parish council plan to refurbish Hook Community Centre, in Ravenscroft.

Councillor Martin Whittaker, chairman of the parish council, said that this would cost between £1.4 and £1.6million, up from a previous estimate of £1.2m, but added the exact cost could not be disclosed because the contract was out to tender.

He said the parish council would need permission from the village to apply for a £800,000 low-interest loan from the Public Works Loan Board. The rest of the funding would come from parish council reserves and the loan would be paid off using, in part, money from any future development to the north east of Hook.

As reported in The Gazette, Hook Parish Council wants to renovate the 25-year-old building, making improvements to its heating and acoustics, along with converting changing rooms into a crèche and building a cafe.

But villagers at the meeting in the Elizabeth Hall, in Raven Road, complained they could not agree to the loan if they didn’t know the total cost.

Nigel Carpenter, former chairman of the parish council, said: “The figures are very, very vague.

“We need to know a lot more about the costs, when we are going to start and how long it will go on for before this meeting gives the go-ahead for this building.”

Ernie Hobbs, who helped run the new Elizabeth Hall when it opened in 2008, said the proposed plan meant the parish council would be too reliant on developer-money at a time when villagers in Hook were against the building of more houses.

Barry Deller, of Chalky Copse, proposed that the parish council hold a special meeting when they have received an exact total for the work.

He said: “We are talking about a significant sum of money to deal with a significant problem we have inherited.”

Cllr Whittaker said this was an “eminently sensible” idea and agreed to withdraw his request for the village’s backing of the plan.