The Council has just announced that the draft County Plan that was rubbished by a government inspector has at last been withdrawn and that the Council is effectively going back to square one.

The Council is expecting to get its new draft plan to its Inspection-in-Public in February/March 2018 more than 3 years after the abortive one held in autumn 2014.

While a lot of technical stuff that was done for it first attempt will still be relevant, we can only hope that the criticisms of residents across our area about the building on the greenbelt will now be listened to.

The damning report by the government inspector on the first plan backs up the view of many that Labour-run Durham County Council simply failed to listen to us.

And has wasted hundreds of thousands of taxpayers money as well. We will be keeping an eye on this and doing all we can to ensure that a proper consultation process now follows, unlike the previous sham of a consultation.