The Hamrun local council is calling on the police and the Malta Environment and Planning Authority to take steps against the owner of a scheduled 400-year-old building in Atocia Street to ensure he cleans up the place and keeps it permanently closed.

Hamrun council secretary Philip Massa said the council has been writing to the authorities about the building since December 2002 but it had only been boarded up using old pieces of wood, which were soon removed.

The place, known as il-Palazz, is a grade one scheduled property, but rubbish is being dumped inside and it is also being used by drug addicts, the secretary said, adding that it had also caught fire last year.

Mr Massa said there had been a development application for the place to be turned into residential units and garages. The council had objected to this development and Mepa had told the council it was to continue monitoring the site.

The council, Mr Massa said, regularly received complaints from residents about the state of the building and although it was regularly cleaned from the outside it was in a mess inside.

A spokesman for Mepa said when contacted she would be looking into the matter and passing on the information given by the council to the authority's enforcement officers.