£33,550: The amount of public money squandered by the Forest of Dean District Council planning department on a failed judicial review into the already costly appeal that granted outline planning permission to build 95 houses in Tutshill.

Surely the head of planning’s position has become untenable?

Spending £33,550 in questioning the decision of a public inquiry appears to be a gratuitous waste of our Council Tax, but then it is the easiest thing in the world to spend someone else’s money.

For a number of years the Forest of Dean District Council’s disappointing and consistent failure to plan for the required five year land supply has allowed developers to exploit our landscape to their ends rather than to address housing needs.

Even when an element of social housing is included in these applications in line with the regulations this can subsequently be disputed, as in the case of ‘Beachley Hill’ where a reduction to less than 10 per cent of the agreed total has been requested on profit-related grounds.

Tidenham parish is set to receive 250 houses, of which 205 are being forced upon it through appeals.

It is disgraceful that the council’s management has allowed the planning department’s failure to plan and its subsequent futile and costly appeals to carry on unchecked.

Is no-one questioning why our Council Tax is being squandered in this respect?

Perhaps if the elected councillors were required to approve these appeals it might at least stop this waste, although the problems within the council that allow these situations to arise also need to be urgently addressed.

– John Powell, Sedbury.