HEREFORDSHIRE Council was right to keep the Bullinghope homes in its overall development plan for the county because work on other major housing projects has yet to start, the high court heard today.

Tim Jones, for Herefordshire Council, said that the authority's fear of not being able to achieve its government imposed target of 12,200 new homes built by 2011, were upheld by the present situation with other big residential developments.

Mr Jones, told the court that the sites at Holmer (Hereford), Baron's Cross (Leominster), and Tanyard (Ross-on-Wye) were still waiting for work to begin let alone completion.

This, said Mr Jones, was reason enough for the council to over rule the result of a planning enquiry in 2005 that Bullinghope was "totally unsatisfactory for so many homes."

The council is defending a claim by the Dinedor Hill Action Association (DHAA) that it manipulated its own planning and democratic processes to keep the homes in the unitary development plan.

This afternoon, the court heard, that the claim failed to understand the great importance for social and economic reasons of the timely delivery of new housing, an increased need established by the regulatory development strategy.

Mr Jones told the court that the council forecast was accurate and doubts over the meeting the housing targets justified.

"With four-and-a-half years of timetable target to go a responsible council should be questioning its capacity to meet the target," he said.

The inspector's decision was reached in a context of 600 new homes a year being required, that number has now jumped to 830 and the government believes that still may not be enough, he said.

The case continues.