TWO local councillors have been defeated in a bid to ensure deliveries to a yet-to-open supermarket take place before 9pm.

The Co-op shut the doors of its Dunbar Road store for good on January 10.

Discount retailer Aldi will move into the now-empty store this summer and approached East Lothian Council’s planning committee about opening and delivery hours on Tuesday morning.

Steven Robb, from GVA Grimley Ltd, told the meeting that Aldi was looking to change the opening hours from 8am to 8pm Monday to Friday and 8am to 6pm at the weekend, to 8am to 10pm Monday to Saturday and 9am to 7pm on Sundays.

They were also looking to be able to deliver at any time.

East Lothian Council’s environmental protection manager was satisfied with the changing to opening hours.

However, he called for no goods delivery vehicles to enter or leave the site between 11pm and 7am throughout the week.

Councillors Jim Goodfellow and David Berry urged fellow committee members to go a step further and restrict delivery times to 9pm throughout the week.

Mr Goodfellow stressed that he welcomed Aldi and the 39 jobs it would create and declared he was “an Aldi shopper”.

However, he said he did have concerns about the potential of deliveries coming late at night.

Planning permission was granted in March 1993 for the erection of a supermarket on the site, which is opposite Recreation Park.

Thirteen planning conditions were attached, with condition seven outlining the opening hours and acceptable delivery times.

Those were put in place to “safeguard the amenity” of nearby residents.

Mr Goodfellow felt the same reasoning was appropriate 22 years later.

He added: “I would question the environmental protection manager’s judgement that 11pm is a reasonable time to put a limit on.

“I don’t know when he puts his schoolchildren to bed but most are in bed before 9pm.” Ward colleague Mr Berry backed his fellow councillor and agreed schoolchildren should not be up at 11pm.

However, their feelings did not win favour with the remaining councillors on the committee.

They agreed there could be no overnight parking of delivery vehicles but agreed that deliveries could take place during “daytime hours” – anywhere between 7am and 11pm.

The report stated that deliveries between those times would “not have a harmful noise impact on the amenity of any neighbouring or nearby residential property”.