Runaways charity Safe@Last called the Park House property home until last summer, before decamping to better premises at the Waterside Business Park across town.

Rotherham Council leases the now-unoccupied Lodge Lane building from the Coal Industry Social Welfare Organisation (CISWO), a Rotherham-based national charity delivering community services in former mining areas.

Now residents near Park House are regularly awoken by the alarm system, as the boarded up building - which dates back to 1926 – becomes a magnet for anti-social behaviour.

"It's not that it's a bad building, just that the youngsters have got into it," said Dawn Hamblett, who lives nearby and often walks her dog in the otherwise picturesque area.

"The other day there were some young lads I saw coming out of it. You could smell that they had been smoking drugs there."

"Someone came along last weekend to board the place up. But you know if they've got in once, then they'll get in again."

Mrs Hamblett said the problems started just as soon as Safe@Last vacated the site last August.

"It started the minute the fencing came down after they left. It's so secluded, which means it's ideal for youths to hang around there."

"When the pit went it was left to rack and ruin. And then since Safe@Last left the same thing has happened again. It's a shame, but something needs doing. If it can't be done up then it should be knocked down before someone gets hurt."

When it was owned by the miners welfare, Park House was used as a snooker hall and permanently inhabited.

"At dinnertime, all the school lads come up, kicking the hell out of it and swearing," said another local resident, who did not wish to be named. "Then about seven in the evening they all come back."

"This has been happening for about eight months now. When we were kids it used to be a snooker hall and someone used to live there."

"The other night the alarm went off and carried on until the battery went flat. The simple solution is for someone to live there again."

One resident from nearby The Crescent said the alarm sounding was a real source of irritation.

"It goes off most weekends, and it was going for a full day one day last week," he said. "We were not even aware that no-one was using the building until a couple of weeks ago."

A Safe@Last spokesman revealed vandalism on Lodge Lane had been a prompting factor in the charity's relocation.

"Safe@Last were at the Park House building for more than three years," she said. "We moved out last August and we believe the premises have been empty since then."

"One of the reasons why we left was because of vandalism. There were also problems with flooding and tiles on the roof."

"It is Rotherham Council who still have the lease on it.