MINEHEAD'S Regal Theatre has won a five-year battle to open its doors to the whole community. Jubilant members of MATA, the voluntary organisation which runs the 1930s town centre building, heard this week that local planners had given the go-ahead for a long awaited scheme to install a lift. Problems with making the theatre totally accessible to the disabled have in the past scuppered MATA's chances of attracting major grant aid for a range of regeneration projects aimed at improving the theatre. Spokesman Elaine Ross said the difficulty had been that the theatre simply did not have sufficient 'footprint' to include a lift. But now businessman John Welch, who owns the theatre and the rest of the adjoining building, has given MATA a vital piece of land to allow its plans to become a reality. "We are just so relieved and excited that we have finally got planning permission," said Mrs Ross. "We didn't need much land but we would have been unable to go forward without it. "West Somerset District Council, the planning authority, apparently felt that the scheme fitted all the right criteria and would enhance the town centre as well as making the theatre disabled compliant." MATA is now preparing to launch Lift Off - the appeal which will hopefully raise the estimated £400,000 needed for the lift and a new theatre frontage. Mrs Ross said there was already around £10,000 in the kitty towards the project and with planning permission in the bag, applications would now be made to major grant bodies, such as the Lottery, and trusts and foundations. Organisers have been working closely with Withycombe-based architect Louise Crossman, who has given some of her services free, and who will now be working out detailed costings and fine- tuning the plans. The appeal is likely to go public during the theatre's summer show, Me and My Girl, in August.