PLANS for a new restaurant and delicatessen in the centre of Helensburgh face a crucial hearing next month.

The Glasgow-based Peckham's chain has applied to the Argyll and Bute licensing board for an on-sales and off-sales licence for the former municipal buildings on the corner of Sinclair Street and East Princes Street.

The application will be considered by the licensing board on Tuesday, April 11 – but the closing date for objections to the application is this coming Tuesday, March 28.

The company's planning application to convert the imposing building in the heart of the town was made public last September, and approved by Argyll and Bute Council officials two months later.

In addition to the deli and restaurant on the ground floor, the firm is also hoping to install function suites in the building and to form six flats on the upper floors.

In response to representations from statutory consultees, and also from the owners of the neighbouring Gordon's Chemist in Sinclair Street, the company has agreed to scrap plans to provide outdoor seating at the rear of the property, to reduce the width of the outdoor seating area in Sinclair Street, and not to continue the outdoor seating around the corner into East Princes Street.

Designed and built by architect John Honeyman in 1878 on the site of a former theatre, the building – and its later northern extension on Sinclair Street – once housed the town's council chamber, police station, court and fire station.

It was put up for sale by Argyll and Bute Council, with an asking price of £220,000, after the authority decided to build the new Helensburgh and Lomond Civic Centre in East Clyde Street.

Peckham's was established in 1982 and currently has two branches in the west end of Glasgow, in Byres Road and Hyndland Road; the firm also operates an online hamper-ordering service.

Next month's licensing board meeting will also consider two applications to vary existing licences in the Helensburgh and Lomond area.

Fiona Campbell is seeking a variation to an off-sales licence for The Larder at Mansfield Studios in Arrochar, and Murdo MacLeod has applied for permission to vary the terms of an on-sales licence for the Knockderry House Hotel in Cove.