Supermarket giant Tesco faces an inquiry over the removal of antique brass windows from a Grade II listed building.

Brighton and Hove City Council issued enforcement notices against the company in February for five alleged breaches of listed building consent at its latest Tesco Express store in Hove.

Council bosses say Tesco left it until the last possible moment before revealing it planned to appeal against the notices.

Tesco, dubbed Britain's biggest grocer after it notched up a £1 billion profit, opened the store on the ground floor of Palmeira House in February.

The upper floors of the building in Western Road have been converted into luxury apartments overlooking Palmeira Square.

Palmeira House was once the town's finest emporium and known as the Harrods of Hove, selling a huge variety of wares.

Dating from 1873, the building included a reading room and a facility where customers could buy and sell shares on the London Stock Exchange.

It later became Maples furniture store and was most recently home to Michael Norman Antiques. It was sold for an undisclosed sum.

The antique brass windows, which were the main feature of the building, have been replaced with smaller metal-framed windows in Tesco's corporate blue.

Tesco has made internal and external alterations which also concern councillors.

They include installing an internal suspended ceiling and creating internal partitions to provide a cash office.

The company has built new entrance doors and put in enlarged fascias above the shop windows.

Councillor Bob Carden, planning chairman, said: "It is all very well Tesco being the biggest and most profitable grocer in the country. That does not give it the right to do what it likes to our wonderful listed buildings.

"Speedy action was quite rightly taken to issue enforcement notices when we saw what Tesco had done.

"I am very concerned that listed buildings in our city should receive the protection they deserve. I would like to see the brass windows put back but we will now have to wait and see what happens."

A council spokeswoman said: "We're very unhappy with the way Tesco has changed the ground floor of Palmeira House, a beautiful Grade II listed building.

"We served an enforcement notice on March 21, requiring the company to make changes to the shopfront to try to put back some of the character it had before Tesco moved in.

"Tesco has appealed against the enforcement notice and we're now waiting for an independent planning inspector to make a decision on the appeal.

"Hopefully it will go in our favour and Tesco will have four months from the date of the decision to put things right or face prosecution."

A Tesco spokeswoman said the company had held "protracted" discussions with the council over the external shopfront works.

She said: "We believed this was reaching an amicable conclusion. We were convinced our proposals were satisfactory to officers as approvals were recommended.

"However, due to impending deadlines the work was carried out and an enforcement notice was served on us. We had been working on plans for a remediation scheme and submitted these to the council on April 1.

"To date, we have had no formal feedback on these.

"However, we very much hope to hear from the council and press on to a mutually satisfactory solution in the near future."

Friday April 30, 2004