CAMPAIGNERS have been told a deadline to speak up about a controversial planning development is wrong... and is not really a deadline after all.

Dale Heenan (Con, Covingham and Nythe), the cabinet’s head of planning, believed the cut-off point to submit views on the Coate Water development was yesterday, as stated in a letter to him.

But the planning inspectorate, which will meet on November 15 to hear the developers’ appeal against the rejection of the Coate plans, was yesterday continuing to list the cut-off date online as September 23.

.A spokesman for DCLG, which looks after planning inspectorate affairs, said: “The correct date is the one in the letter to the council – September 13.

“It is helpful for representations to be submitted by the due date but they will be accepted up until the inquiry date.”

The news has met with a mixed response by campaigners, who have distributed around 5,000 postcards to residents, bearing messages of objection and addressed to the planning inspectorate.

Save Coate campaigner Jean Saunders, 65, of Longcot, said: “That’s ridiculous. That really isn’t on. Okay, yes, we’ve still got until any time to keep submitting stuff, but Felicity Cobb (a fellow campaigner) has actually got something like 3,000 signatures and some documents she wants to take to the planning inspector. She was planning to go on the 23rd.

“That’s really poor advice. I’ve been telling everyone it’s September 23. Our campaign postcards are all geared up to the 23rd. This is a really poor performance as far as the Bristol office is concerned, that they can’t get their dates right. It doesn’t bode well for the rest of their performance.”

After being contacted by the Adver and Coate protesters, the Planning Inspectorate have now said that they have changed the date back to September 23 to give everyone a fair chance to submit their views Chris Barry, 65, a semi-retired GP from The Bramptons, Shaw, said it was good news that they could submit their objections any time, and urged fellow campaigners to do so.

He said: “All we can do is say what we feel: this development would be a desecration of the rural nature of Coate Water, and a desecration of the memory of Richard Jefferies.

“In no way can the man on the Clapham omnibus see it as a sustainable development.

“We’ve always been told we really need the land to build houses, but then we have got the whole Eastern Development Area. I see letters in the paper saying people drive past building sites on green fields and then they drive past empty office buildings.

“Please, if you care about Coate, write to the planning inspector.”

The planning inspectorate amended its website to give the correct date after being called by The Adver.

The address to write to is Mr E Grace, Planning Inspector, Temple Quay House, 2 The Square, Temple Quay Bristol, BS1 6NP, quoting reference number APP/U3935/A/11/2155834 .