THERE are calls for West Devon's controversial core strategy to be abolished in light of the new Government's decision to scrap housing targets across the country.

From now on local authorities will have the freedom to make planning decisions themselves without figures being imposed on them from Central Government.

In West Devon's core strategy 900 homes are planned for Okehampton and 750 for Tavistock in edge of town extensions.

But the leader of West Devon Borough Council, James McInnes, confirmed this week the council would be happy to look at housing needs again in light of the change in Government policy.

Opponents to the core strategy are demanding the authority revise its plans for building houses and follow the example of South Oxfordshire District Council and scrap the core strategy immediately.

Borough Cllr Ted Sherrell said: 'It is now totally untenable. It was always an imposition contrary to the wishes of the great majority of the citizens of West Devon and now it does not even have the technical legitimacy of being Government policy.'

The core strategy was approved by the future planning and housing committee in April by six votes to four but there has been strong opposition both in Tavistock and Okehampton to the level and location of housing and delivery of infrastructure.

Conservative councillor Christine Marsh, who is also now chairman of Devon County Council, resigned as a member of the committee after she claimed she was substituted at the crucial meeting by her political group because she was going to vote against the controversial plans.

Cllr Marsh said this week she hoped the core strategy would come back to the table: 'The solution is not just to build houses and worry about the infrastructure afterwards.

'I recognise we need houses but not to this extreme. If the council is determined to build this level of housing we should create a separate settlement, not just keep adding on to Okehampton.'

An opponent of the strategy, Maureen Bryant, has lived in Okehampton for 36 years and said the town already had problems with traffic congestion: 'This core strategy has to be scrapped — it will bring about the total destruction of Okehampton.

'Businesses do not want to come here because of the traffic and people so do not want to shop here because it is easier to shop in Tavistock, Launceston and Exeter.

'We need affordable housing but we don't need 900 houses. The housing numbers are totally outrageous. This core strategy was pushed through, three weeks before a general election. What was the urgency when the likelihood was that all the rules and regulations were going to change anyway?'

Borough councillor David Weeks, who represents five villages around Okehampton, said he would be writing to council officers urging that the core strategy be looked at again: 'There is no desperate hurry. I accept there is a waiting list for housing but there are other ways of delivering it, including small scale housing developments in villages.

'West Devon officers have argued all along that we have no choice about how many houses we build — well now we do, so let's get it right.'

A spokesman for the Department for Communities said it was up to councils whether they wanted to continue with their core strategies or not — the Government was not making them.

Government communities secretary Eric Pickles has written to all district and borough authorities giving councils and communities the freedom to make planning decisions in the knowledge regional strategies will soon be history.

He said: 'We've promised to use legislation to scrap top-down building targets that are eating up the Green Belt, but I am not going to make communities wait any longer to start making decisions for themselves.'

A statement to the Times from West Devon Borough Council said despite the abolition of the regional spatial strategy (RSS) and the withdrawal of regional housing targets, the housing need for West Devon remained high.

The council had a duty to meet these housing needs and had plans in place to ensure an appropriate level of new homes could still be delivered, in the right locations.

Chairman of the council's future housing and planning committee Conservative Diana Moyse said the council was confident the future plans it had developed met the needs of the local community and it would continue to promote the proposals set out in the core strategy for West Devon.

'The plans ensure that employment opportunities and other infrastructure, such as new schools and healthcare facilities, are provided alongside new housing to deliver improvements in the quality of life for local people.

'The risk of not having the core strategy is that an increased amount of housing development could take place on other sites throughout the borough, without providing the infrastructure and facilities that local communities need.'