THE owner of a Bournemouth hotel has expressed his fear that visitors may be injured by needles in a neighbouring garden.

Ken Robins, who has run the Hotel Celebrity for 18 years, said that over the past few weeks his staff have collected several syringes left by drug users in the grounds of the boarded-up Orchid Gardens building next door, which was formerly the Woodcroft Hotel.

Now he fears that with summer approaching and hordes of tourists set to descend on East Cliff and Gervis Road in particular, it is only a matter of time before someone is hurt.

“We are concerned about the sheer level of drug use at the site,” he said.

“It was a problem about two years ago but that died down, but it has sprung up again over the past few weeks and our concern is the risk to people going into the summer.

“When it gets warmer many people come here, including children who run around the area, and this is a disaster waiting to happen.”

The former 57-bedroom Woodcroft Hotel went into administration in 2012 and was bought by the owners of the Orchid Hotel across the road, since when it has been used for storage and car parking.

Mr Robins said he believes the site should be protected with security fencing.

Orchid Hotel operations manager Christina Ioannides said they would investigate the site.

“We have been keeping an eye on it and have had no problems whatsoever since last Saturday,” she said.

“We had a walk around and found one chap asleep around the back who we think was a drug user. We phoned the police who told us not to get involved.

“I will be talking with my business partner to see if there is anything else we can do to avoid that happening.”

She said they were confident there was no access to the building and the site is inspected each day by a parking attendant, who is also charged with checking for flytipped rubbish.

She said they were in talks with the Meyrick Estate, the freeholder for many properties in East Cliff, about the future of the site, and they hope to have more developed plans in place by the end of the summer.

“Bournemouth is quite a difficult market and we don’t want to do a slapdash job across the road and make a mistake,” she said.

Dorset Police said they would be investigating the area.