THURROCK Council leader Rob Gledhill has been reflecting on the implications of the Secretary of State for Planning's decision not to 'call in' a controversial planning application for new homes on Thurrock Marshes.

As Thurrock Nub News exclusively reported at the weekend, the much-debated proposal to build up to 161 dwellings on the land between Little Thurrock and Tilbury is now set to go ahead after the council's legal and planning teams' pleas for the minister to step in feel on deaf ears.

The decision had been forced through by a narrow majority of councillors on the council's planning committee against advice from officers and on the back of a serious warning from the council's solicitor that they were moving into dangerous and possibly expensive territory.

It is likely the scheme will now be built but council leader Cllr Rob Gledhill says that doesn't mean the building on a flood plain has been endorsed by the government.

Speaking to Thurrock Nub News he delivered a broadside to the renegade councillors, which include members of his own Conservative group, saying: "While it is disappointing that the Secretary of State hasn't used his powers to review this decision it most certainly isn't the same as endorsing what the majority of the committee decided. This is outlined in his letter and has been the case since 2012.

"However, it is more disappointing that certain councillors have repeatedly called in officer-refused, small greenbelt planning applications then, along with much larger applications such as this, have ignored the advice of officers and approved those applications with little regard to the impact on our green belt, and in this case the flood plain.

"More so the myth that is pushed by certain members on the committee that the "Secretary of State makes the final decision" is misleading at best. It is very clear that the Secretary of State will only intervene in exceptional circumstances not, as some would have you believe, every single application approved on the greenbelt.

"All members are aware that the council is working on its local plan, especially those who have been councillors for over a decade, and the faster it is agreed and implemented the faster the council will be able to stop these speculative, inappropriate applications on the greenbelt. Until then the buck stops at the councillors who make the call-ins and or the decisions and nowhere else.

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"With a focus on high quality, community-led, infrastructure-first development, as we move forward with the local plan I would urge all residents to read the proposals, to look at how it will benefit their community as whole and make their voice heard to stop this type of uncontrolled assault on our greenbelt."