Villagers are in uproar over plans to turn a 400-year-old pub – called “the heart of the community” – into a house.

A change of use application has been submitted to Craven District Council for The Masons Arms in Eastby, which was sold recently for about £240,000.

If planners give the go-ahead, it will be converted to a house with four bedrooms and two letting rooms.

It has sparked anger in the community about a claimed lack of consultation.

A 30-signature letter has been sent to the district council and Embsay Parish Council is being urged to hold an extraordinary meeting to allow villagers to have their say.

The letter was put together following a quickly-organised meeting at the home of Fran van de Geest, who lives close to the pub.

The villagers’ letter says: “The Masons Arms was our central hub and has been greatly missed since its closure when the lease ended and Enterprise Inns decided to sell. As it was marketed and sold as a public house, we, the village and regulars had assumed that any purchaser would refurbish the building and open it once again as a public house or as a restaurant with public bar.

“We are very dismayed to find that the application is for change of use to a very large dwelling. If successful, The Masons Arms, a public house here in Eastby for over 400 years, will be lost forever.”

Ann McIntosh, who has lived in the village with her family for six years, said: “If it goes we will lose the heart of the village and we will become just a through village without a centre.”

Embsay with Eastby Parish Council informed the district council of its “dismay and regret” at the potential loss of the pub at its last meeting.

Parish council chairman Mark Wilson said: “This is a tragedy for Eastby and the Dales because it is yet another traditional local pub which is going to the wall.

“But refusing permission is not going to mean it could operate as a pub especially in this economic climate.”