IT'S set to be one of the most expensive removal jobs ever.

Civic chiefs splashed out £20,000 on two wrought iron gates that would welcome shoppers into a prestigious £30m development and act as a gateway to a Hampshire town.

Now they're planning to spend a further £30,000 moving them just a couple of hundred yards away - because they led to a dead end and are unnoticeable.

The gates, installed in time for the Queen's Jubilee in 2002, had been put in place on the site of Fareham's planned Market Quay development before work really got under way.

However, the plans for the development then changed - leaving the "gates to nowhere" tucked away in an alley off West Street.

Now plans are in hand to move the dark blue gates from their current home opposite Woolworths - to the back of the shopping centre off the Quay Street roundabout.

Council chiefs have hit back at accusations that they have made a blunder - saying they had always known they might have to move the gates, and had even budgeted for it.

They say part of the sum will be spent on planting an avenue of trees along a footpath that will connect the gates with Market Quay.

Opposition councillors and community figures say spending any more money on the gates is a waste - especially as the town's community centre is under threat of closure.

Councillor Peter Davies, who branded the gates a "glorified fire exit", said: "I'm all for having more trees but I don't think they should waste any more money on the gates - I just don't see the point. They botched it up the first time round when they stuck them in the middle of nowhere," he said.

Chairman of Fareham Community Centre, Audrey Sitch, is outraged the funds are being spent on a "council blunder" when the town's community centre is doomed for closure.

"I think it is a ridiculous amount of money to spend on something that trivial. I sometimes think the council just does not know what it is doing. That money could go a long way to sorting out our community centre," she said.

However, borough council planners defended the decision.

Planning committee chairman, Councillor Nick Walker, said: "The gates did lead to nowhere. They cost a lot of money and hiding them away is not a good idea. We have finally come up with the idea to put them by the Quay Street roundabout where they will be visible from all directions."

The hefty sum ring-fenced for the project will come from the town centre redevelopment fund and the council's tree-planting fund.

Leader of the council Cllr Sean Woodward said: "We wanted the gates there for the Jubilee but we knew in the back of our minds they might need to be moved later on.

"The contingency money for town centre redevelopment was set aside for eventualities like this."

Planning chiefs will make a final decision on the gates at a planning meeting later this year.