Winchester campaigners have suffered a major setback in their battle against a phone mast.

The Law Lords yesterday refused to hear an appeal by residents against the siting of a mast near Western Primary School in Byron Avenue.

Campaign spokesman Karen Barratt said: "It's concern for the children's health that has driven the campaign. It is the reason we carry on fighting. We are not going to give up just because we have suffered a setback."

Last December, the Court of Appeal dismissed a challenge brought in the names of two children against a High Court judge's refusal to review planning consent following a public inquiry.

Lawyers for Phoebe St Leger-Davey, six, of Chilbolton Avenue, and James Harrison, seven, of Poets Way, had told the court that they lived and went to school within 250 to 300 metres of the mast site and within the zone of greatest intensity of electromagnetic emissions.

They and their families were concerned about the potential health impacts.

The children wanted an order overturning a planning inspector's decision last August giving the go-ahead for the 11.79 metre-high mast.

It was argued that Orange should have challenged the refusal of the owners of two alternative sites - the roof of Hampshire Police headquarters and the car park at Winchester railway station - to allow the mast to be erected there.

However, the appeal judges held there was no legal obligation on a mobile phone operator to take such court action.

The judges ruled that the planning inspector had been entitled to conclude that there was no better location than Byron Avenue after Hampshire Police and Network Rail said their sites were unavailable.

The children's lawyers then petitioned the House of Lords for permission to take the case further. But the Lords, in a decision announced today, refused leave to appeal.

Mrs Barratt, of Byron Avenue, said: "We are very disappointed but not entirely surprised. Things are so biased in favour of the telecom operators.

"There is the possibility of taking this to the European courts. I don't yet know if that is possible."