A JEWELLER says he will close his business this month because Colchester Council has refused to let him use his shutters.

Hosh Slar plans to shut Hosh jewellery store in Crouch Street after two-and-a-half years of trading and move to London or another town or city in East Anglia.

He says the valuable goods displayed in the shopfront mean he needs shutters.

He insists they do not make the surrounding conservation area look rundown.

Mr Slar said: “Whatever I try to do doesn’t work, so I’m going to move the shop.

“I’m going to take the whole thing down, put the shop boards up and it will look horrible.”

Mr Slar spent £4,500 on shutters before applying for planning permission.

He appealed after Colchester Council refused to let him keep the shutters in April 2009, but an independent inspector rejected the appeal in July 2010 and he removed them.

The inspector recognised Mr Slar was the first tenant at the shop since travel agent Thomas Cook had moved out, and had improved its appearance. But he said Crouch Street was a conservation area and described the shutter as an “unsympathetic change”.

Mr Slar said the council had told him alternative shutters may be acceptable, but he said they were not appropriate and would cost a further £3,000.

Ron Levy, secretary of the Colchester Retail and Business Association, said while he sympathised with the need to make the town look attractive, businesses needed the council’s support.

He added: “It’s a great asset to the town and I think it will be a very sad loss.

“That’s a prime position there and it will not do the town any good to see a shop like that close down.”