LOCALS and a developer face yet another wait for a decision on a 77-home estate, after angry councillors accused Persimmon Homes of ’taking the mickey’ by failing to make changes to the plans.

During a lively debate at the recent meeting of South Hams Council’s development management committee, members spoke scathingly of the adjustments made to the scheme after it was deferred at the January meeting.

Cllr Mike Saltern, who represents the area on the district council ’strongly suggested’ to the committee that the scheme was refused. He said the plans had come back from Persimmon in the quickest possible time and the company had made the ’absolute minimum’ of changes.

Cllr Saltern was however grateful for a mention of the cumulative impact on Ivybridge of the several hundred new homes in the pipeline for the town.

But he added: ’We need to take a step back; the original pre-application discussions were over 65 homes, and if that was what they were applying for now we wouldn’t be having these discussions.’

Committee member Cllr Judy Pearce compared seeing Persimmon’s revised plans with watching David Cameron renegotiate Britain’s relationship with the European Union: ’They’ve had three months, but not much has moved.’

Cllr Pearce said many of the issues she raised at the previous meeting, like parking and bin storage had not been fully resolved, and asked: ’Is this an acceptable way to be building houses?’

Read more in the Ivybridge & South Brent Gazette