A DECISION on whether to build 62 new homes has been put on hold to ensure a village will not become overrun with sewage.

The application by Piper Homes would see the new homes built in Crowle near Worcester but a decision was delayed by Wychavon District Council’s planning committee to make sure the village’s sewage system would be fit for purpose before the first bricks were allowed to be laid.

The council’s planning officers had recommended that councillors approved the plan at the meeting in Pershore on July 20 with a condition included that Severn Trent was expected to make sure a proper sewage system was in place before half of the homes were filled.

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But the lack of guarantee made some councillors uneasy with much of the committee wanting reassurance that a system would be built before any of the homes were occupied and agreed to delay a decision until the council could negotiate with Severn Trent.

Spitfire Homes had its plan to build 30 homes on land less than half a mile away from Froxmere Road off the village’s Church Road backed by the committee at the same meeting on July 20.

Crowle parish councillor Ian Boden said the application, coupled with other plans nearby, would increase the size of the village by at least a quarter.

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“That rate and pace of growth cannot be accommodated without major infrastructure improvements and really cannot be considered to be sustainable development in a small rural village,” he said at the meeting in Pershore on July 20.

The earmarked land for 62 new homes is outside Crowle’s current designated development boundary but was put forward as a potential site for up to 40 new homes during the ongoing review of the South Worcestershire Development Plan (SWDP), the key county planning blueprint which sets out where thousands of homes will be built in the next 20 years.

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Cllr Margaret Rowley said 62 homes was “too many” but her call to turn the plan down was lost when it was put to a vote. The committee then voted to defer a decision by 13 votes with one abstention.

Cllr Paul Middlebrough said he was “comfortable” with 40 homes being built but “flabbergasted” by a request for a 50 per cent increase.

Cllr Middlebrough said the village’s potential problem with sewage was being “vastly understated” and needed sorting before any more homes were built.

Cllr Nick Dawkes said he “could not vote for something that was potentially going to pollute a brook.”

“Until that is addressed before development,” he said at the meeting on July 20. “I could never vote for it.”

Ahead of the meeting, a total of 40 objections were made against the plan by villagers in Crowle.

The recommendation from Wychavon’s planning officers that the homes should be approved came despite the application missing key information on the planned mix of homes, affordable housing, biodiversity and highways - information that was not made available until the day before the committee met.