Council bosses have raised doubts about the need for a new £3.5 billion theme park planned for the south east of England.

The London Resort will be based on the Swanscombe Peninsula just over the Essex border in Kent.

It will include hotels, shops and restaurants, and could open to the public in 2024.

The Secretary of State has yet to give final approval to the proposals to build the biggest theme park in Europe since Disneyland Paris was set-up in the 1990s.

The London Resort’s proposals have met the standards required to be accepted for examination and will likely be ruled on within the next year/ 18 months.

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It is hoped the resort - which will be 135 times the size of Wembley stadium - will be one of the UK's largest single site employers, and could contribute up to £50bn to the economy.

But Basildon Council, which has been consulted on the plans, has called for “realism” over what the project will and won’t achieve.

Bosses say they are unsure if the demand is there for such a large theme park.

They have also noted that 10,000 of the proposed 17,300 new jobs created by the attraction would likely be part-time.

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In its response to the application, the council added: “While this proposal has clear planning merits, makes good use of brownfield land and will be a significant employment generator, the fact that such ‘globally recognised’ theme parks do not presently exist in the UK - with a population of almost 67 million people - may be indicative of a general overall lack of demand.

“This does not appear to have been contemplated by the developers, but parks such as the American Adventure in Derbyshire also failed despite being hugely popular during the first half of its existence from 1986-2007.”

Bosses also say it is unclear if the resort’s main appeal will be to day-trippers from the UK, or tourists abroad.

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The London Resort is expected to create a park and ride station in Tilbury which will see 25 per cent of car passengers travel across the Thames via ferry to the resort in a bid to ease congestion on the roads and trains.