Radstock Town Council will be strongly opposing Mendip District Council's latest draft local plan - accusing their neighbour of "chucking all their houses on the boundary with BANES".

Showing ferocity not common at the monthly meeting, councillors were told that under the new revised plan, a whole estate worth of houses would be going up close to Writhlington.

Cllr Chris Dando told the meeting: " How dare they, We are struggling to give services our areas, and then they propose putting more housing near to Orchid way (in Writhlington) just the other side of the Mendip boundary."

Mendip Council is being told that it has to provide another 505 homes under its Local Plan and has identified several sites close to Radstock which it proposes could be built on.

The modified Mendip Plan is now up for discussion with comments due by March 2.

Under the initial plan Mendip was committed to building 9,635 homes across the district, but now the inspectorate wants them to increase that by a further 505 houses - and they have penciled in areas around Radstock and Midsomer Norton to take that expansion.

In the draft document Mendip Council writes: "Allocations are likely to focus on sustainable locations in accordance with the plan's overall spatial strategy in Core Policy 1 and may include land in the north/north-east of the District primarily adjacent to the towns of Radstock and Midsomer Norton in accordance with para 4.7"

The three sites under consideration are shown in coloured bands in the maps above.

The draft proposals have only just come to light, with Mendip conceding that they have not yet assessed the viability of sites adjacent to Midsomer Norton/Radstock.

Cllr Dando was unanimously supported by Radstock Council when he proposed that they strongly oppose the new draft map.

He added we need to be " fierce and unanimous" in our opposition.