A major row is brewing over who runs Dartmouth's Royal Avenue Gardens amenity hut, amid controversial moves to snatch the job away from the town council.

For years the hut has been a vital money spinning venue for local charity fetes with the town council deciding who books the district council owned building.

Now both the town's tourist information centre and the nearby Flavel have been asked if they would like to take on the job of running the hut – and cash in on the hire charges at the same time.

And one of the main reasons behind the move is the town council policy to ban all hut events on Tuesdays and Fridays so they do not clash with the two market days.

Dartmouth district councillor Jonathan Hawkins said one option being looked at was the hut being run through the TIC or the Flavel.

And he stressed that his main concern about the running of the hut was the market day bans.

'The whole idea of the amenity hut is that it is for charitable organisations and that is what we are fighting tooth and nail to support.

'If the town council removes the condition that it cannot be rented on Tuesdays and Fridays there would be no problem with the town council running it.

'They do a good job but I don't think they should set conditions that are unfair. At the end of the day, the amenity hut is there for charitable groups and to say no to them using it for two days a week is not right.'

The hut, the bandstand and the Royal Avenue Gardens as a whole are all owned by South Hams Council.

Until now the town council has had the job of hiring out the hut while the South Hams Council has taken responsibility for the hiring of the major Dartmouth events – regatta, the music and food festivals and the Candlelit Dartmouth Christmas event.

The town council lease on the hut ran out in January last year and has not been renewed.

The hut is rented out up to 50 times a year by various charitable organisations, from Dartmouth in Bloom to the Old Dartmothians, all out to cash in on the coach loads of visitors who pour through the gardens every week.

The town council decided in 2008 that the hut could not be hired on Friday market days and extended that ban to the Tuesday market day in 2011 following concerns from market traders that fetes were sucking cash away from the town council's own market complex.

Last week an informal meeting between the town clerk and officers to review the situation turned into a hot potato after town councillors heard rumours about the move to involve the TIC or the Flavel.

Nine out of the town's 16 councillors turned up for the meeting where they 'expressed their concerns,' said town clerk Chris Horan.

He said the councillors had found it 'very disappointing' that they had not been informed about the latest proposals which would take the running of the hut out of their hands and that they heard about it through 'unofficial sources'.

He said they had been so concerned about the situation that an informal meeting involving town councillors and all four of the Dartmouth district councillors was arranged for next week.