LEADING Tavistock councillor Paul Ward is to make a heartfelt plea to borough planners to ditch a controversial housing development earmarked for the outskirts of the town.

West Devon Borough Council will decide on Tuesday whether to accept officers’ recommendations give Newton Abbot-based Baker Estates planning permission for 44 homes and an ’extra care unit’ on Plymouth Road.

Tavistock town council development management and licensing committee Cllr Paul Ward will address the borough council in person on Tuesday, urging them to turn the application down.

Town councillors insist the application will deprive Tavistock of badly-needed land for local employment in the future and will not include affordable housing to enable local residents to live where they work.

They are also deeply concerned about plans for the four-storey extra care unit, which they say will dominate the landscape at the gateway of a World Heritage site.

Town councillors were today urging residents to protest about the application, which will be considered by the borough council’s development management and licensing committee on Tuesday.

Cllr Ward told a meeting of his own committee on Tuesday night: ’We have objected to this application twice before and I can see no reason for us to change our minds.’