Court action over 4,000 new homes

Ann Ducker said there was no need for development on green belt land

Legal action is being taken against the government over is backing to plans for thousands of new homes on green belt land in south Oxfordshire.

South Oxfordshire District Council said it had served papers on the state on Monday over South East Plans for 4,000 homes in Grenoble Road, south Oxford.

District council leader Ann Ducker said the projected level of development was unsustainable and unnecessary.

A government spokesman said the appeal had been acknowledged.

The Campaign for Rural England (CPRE) said it would also fight the development through the courts.

The government is being completely inconsistent Helena Whall, Campaign For Rural England

The district council said lawyers had advised there were grounds to challenge the plan.

Angie Paterson, the council's cabinet member for planning, said: "We are totally opposed to development on this green belt land in South Oxfordshire."

The CPRE has also decided to mount a legal challenge against the decision.

CPRE campaign manager Helena Whall said:"The government is being completely inconsistent - since the Green Belt it supports was created specifically to contain Oxford's expansion, and yet at the same time the government is now proposing that Oxford's wish to continue expanding is a reason to start dismantling it.

She said the government's own documents stated there could be "overwhelming evidence" that the Grenoble Road site was "unsuitable" for development.

A public consultation on the plans was held in October 2008.

However, a communities and local government spokesman said the government was committed to preserving the protection of Green Belt status and had "no intention of fundamentally changing this policy".

He added that the amount of Green Belt land had been increased since 1997 but Green Belt boundaries would not be set in stone.