BORED youths flooded a village hall with 200 gallons of oil, costing their community hundreds of pounds.

Following the costly prank, the treasurer of Duddon Memorial Hall has pleaded with parents to keep an eye on their teenagers.

'I hope parents will read this and start to take note of where their children are and what they are doing,' said David Leadbetter.

'We don't know who did it, but whoever it was, was just stupid and brainless.'

On Thursday, last week, Duddon WI were holding a meeting when oil seeped into the hall from an external tank, which fuels the heating system.

Mr Leadbetter was contacted at about 10pm and says he immediately went to Willington Road to stop the leakage caused after youngsters broke the feeding pipe.

'The grass outside was flooded,' he said, 'and the oil had seeped into the hall. I went back the following day and cleaned it up as best I could with paper towels.'

But to add insult to injury, there was a repeat incident the following night.

On Saturday morning Mr Leadbetter visited the hall only to find that, again, youths had tampered with the oil tank.

'They must have gone back to do it again. All the oil that was left was now on the grass and some of it had gone into the hall again.

'Fortunately there was no damage, besides the terrible mess, and some of the oil evaporated on its own.

'But there were about 200 gallons of oil in that tank. I have had to order some more. I haven't had the bill yet, but it will be at least £200.'

After the second time, Mr Leadbetter decided to call the police and two officers attended.

'They said they will look into it. I think they are taking it quite seriously,' said Mr Leadbetter.

Mr Leadbetter said that apart from a few anti-social behaviour problems over a year ago, the youth of Duddon are generally well-behaved.

'It's pretty quiet here. We did have a few broken windows a while back and two years ago, the same thing happened with the oil tank.

'But hopefully we can get the message across that this was not clever.'

Geoff Goldburn, chairman of Duddon Parish Council, said: 'We don't get too much trouble here with youths. But we do get the odd prank. There has been acts of vandalism in the past, kids have taken the top off the tank and other bits and pieces. I would reiterate David Leadbetter's plea and ask youths to think about what they are doing.'

A spokesman for Cheshire Constabulary confirmed that police are investigating the vandalism at the memorial hall.