THE owner of a former cinema said opponents of plans to turn it into a nightclub should put their money where their mouths are.

Steve Peri said councillors and residents who want a shop or covered market at the old Odeon in Crouch Street, Colchester, should “put up, or shut up”.

The millionaire entrepreneur said: “Steve Peri is in the nightclub and entertainment business and that is what he is going to do – not something else that is not viable.

“If someone wants to buy it from me, they can turn it into whatever they want. But I am the owner and I am going to use it for entertainment.”

He plans to resume talks with Colchester Council in the new year over his hopes for the Odeon, which he bought for £1million.

His previous bid to turn the Thirties building into a super-club in a £3million refit was rejected by the council’s planning committee and again on appeal.

Regeneration spokesman Lyn Barton has said it is “not worth resurrecting” the scheme.

But Mr Peri, former owner of the Hippodrome, now Liquid Envy, in the town’s High Street, said councillors would have to accept the building would either be used for entertainment or stay derelict.

He said: “I don’t want to leave it sitting there, because it is costing me money. But it is not for other people to be telling me what I should do with it.

“Why would I want to open a clothes shop or something there? That’s not my business and I don’t know anything about it.

“I surprised quite a few people before in Colchester when I had the Hippodrome. There were people living in flats a few yards away, but we never had any complaints because of the security measures we put in and the way we managed it.

“It was the same with our venues in Chelmsford, and Norwich, where I’ve been working for seven years now. If there are problems with binge-drinking or drugs, or whatever, the answer is to work with the police and council to sort it out.”

The cinema was the town’s first purpose-built venue for films with sounds. It has been boarded up since 2002, and police have revealed they have regular problems with youths breaking in.