WEST Devon Borough Council is investigating a possible breach in the Section 106 agreement of a planning application for the development of 61 homes in North Tawton.

The investigation relates to a marketing strategy.

Developers Wain-homes Ltd, first submitted a controversial planning application back in October 2013, for the construction of a new housing estate at Batheway Fields, west of High Street, in North Tawton.

Despite public concern, NTTC (North Tawton Town Council) supported the application because of a medical centre and industrial area (employment land) that were included in the plans.

The developers had also obtained planning permission for roads, footways, parking, landscaping, drainage, open space and allotments.

Wainhomes has since submitted a new application for 28 more residential dwellings at the site with associated footways, parking, landscaping and drainage. The plans no longer show employment land and the allotments have been relocated.

Recently West Devon Borough Council has been made aware of a possible breach of terms set in the Section 106 agreement for the initial application of 61 homes.

The Section 106 agreement outlines a detailed timetable of the dates that West Devon Borough Council has set for the completion of particular written documentation or payments.

The fifth schedule is that the developer should submit marketing strategy to the council for written approval prior to the occupation of the first dwelling and subsequently to marketing the employment land and medical centre site in accordance with those strategies for a period of five years unless planning permission is granted for an alternative use.

One local resident told the Times that she believed that the first house on the site was occupied two weeks ago and that West Devon Borough Council had not received the marketing strategy.

A spokesperson for the borough council said: ‘We’ve been made aware of a possible breach in the Section 106 agreement concerning the planning application for 61 homes at Batheway Fields, North Tawton.

‘We’re committed to ensuring that Section 106 agreements are complied with across the borough and planning enforcement are currently investigating, and as such, we are not in a position to provide any more information at this point in the process.’

In submitting the new application for 28 extra dwellings the developer has proposed the relocation of the allotments to outside the site area and it no longer shows the employment land.

However, Matthew Loughrey-Robinson, land manager at Wainhomes previously said to the Times: ‘The bigger picture is that employment could be provided in an alternative location in North Tawton which could be considered as part of another connected wider application for the area.’

Wainhomes has not responded to the Times’ request for a comment.