PAYMENTS are to be made to a legal 'fund' to fight the inclusion of proposals for 3,500 homes north of Dorchester in the Dorset Local Plan.

Dorchester town councillors have backed making the payment of up to £3,500 to take on specialist planning legal advice.

Town mayor Alistair Chisholm says the battle over building on the land is as important as the local opposition to the railways when they wanted to plough their lines through the Maumbury Rings Roman amphitheatre site.

"At the end of the day this may come down to a legal battle between lawyers for and against," said Cllr Chisholm.

"If we ignore this and do nothing it will be at our peril," he told the town council's planning and environment committee.

The meeting heard that parish councils at Charminster and Stinsford would be told of the town council's decision, with both likely to be as affected by the housing plans as Dorchester with the proposed site arching around the county town from the A37 junction with Charminster to the Kingston Maurward roundabout at the other end.

Cllr Chisholm, an independent, said he also had the hope that the Tory administration at County Hall was thrown out in the May local council elections.

"Dorset Council, as currently composed, are not interested in public consultation. It tells us a great deal about the direction of Dorset Council. I can only hope the May elections bring us some cheer and that we get a new Dorset Council, after the election, that actually listens," he said, to cheers from a dozen people, including Stinsford and Charminster residents, who attended the town meeting.

The town council has been unanimously against the Dorchester North plans since the idea was first suggested and has already been taking advice from planning consultants to guide its opposite.

In a report to the planning committee town clerk Steve Newman said it was now worth adding to the council's armoury by taking advice from barristers from a legal chamber specialising in planning.

In his report Mr Newman said: "To compliment the planning consultants work it might be worth considering whether to seek legal advice on the policy and the Council's response to it just to ensure that the Council has taken every opportunity to ensure that it is doing the very best it can to protect the town from this potentially damaging policy."

The draft of the new Dorset Local Plan is due to be published in December 2024 with a minimum period of six weeks for representations on the draft.