Westbourne Homes has been granted planning permission to develop land west of Reading Road after winning an appeal. A planning inspector ruled that South Oxfordshire District Council, the planning authority, had failed to show that it had five-year land supply as it submitted its figures too late. This is almost exactly what happened in 2017 when Taylor Wimpey was granted permission for 95 homes at the former Thames Farm, which is next door to the site.

Construction of that development, called Regency Place, has not begun because the company has not been given approval of its controversial drainage plan, which Westbourne also planned to rely on.

The council says it did present the correct figures and followed government guidelines.

The inspector’s decision, which has angered residents and parish councillors in Shiplake, means that the number of homes being, or due to be, built along a short stretch of the A4155 is more than 210, which is over six times the number allocated to the village by the district council. Chris Penrose, chairman of the parish council, accused the district council of “woeful” preparation for the appeal hearing and said residents had once again been “let down”.

He said: “The district council failed to provide five-year housing supply figures at the hearing and sent them in late and was admonished by the inspector for doing so in his final judgement. “This is yet another unsustainable development on Lower Shiplake’s boundary. The parish council put masses of effort into the defence of this site, including hiring of external consulting advice and many hours on the thoroughness of our case based on planning criteria, only to be let down by the district council’s woeful level of preparation for the appeal.

“The district council simply did not do its job well and seems incapable of learning from its past errors or taking responsibility for them.

“We have subsequently asked for consideration of a judicial review of this decision. This has been refused by the district council’s deputy chief executive. Residents are right to be angry and should feel totally let down by the council.”

The appeal hearing was held at Henley town hall in July.

The developer claimed the district council had only enough land to provide homes for the next four years rather than the required five.

The council waited almost a month to contradict this and prove it had more than enough land to meet the target but by this time it was too late.

In his ruling issued last week, the inspector Steven Rennie said the district council failed to provide “acceptable evidence” for refusing the appeal.

He said: “There was opportunity for the council to provide more up-to-date evidence at the hearing on the matter of housing land supply, to counter the evidence of the appellant, but it did not do so at the time.

“The appeal decision is therefore based on the housing land supply information presented at the hearing and not submitted afterwards.”

Westbourne cited a successful appeal by a developer to build 150 homes at Lady Grove in Didcot after a planning inspector concluded that the district council could not demonstrate that it had a five-year supply of deliverable housing land.

Mr Rennie said: “The appellant has undertaken their own analysis, particularly with regard to the deliverability of sites.

“It concluded that many of the dwellings in the council assessment should be discounted as they are not deliverable, resulting in a housing land supply of 4.16 years.

“The council did not provide any substantive evidence to counter either the conclusions of the Lady Grove appeal nor the appellant’s evidence regarding deliverability. While there may have been more up-to-date evidence available since the appeal, or which may be relied upon by the appellant in their assessment, it was not presented to me in detail at the hearing.

“I can only conclude that the council cannot demonstrate a five-year land supply.”

Henley Town Council, which had refused to include the Westbourne site in his its joint neighbourhood plan with Harpsden parish, which includes the Westbourne site, was also disappointed at the decision.

Councillor Ken Arlett, who chairs the neighbourhood plan group and is also a district councillor, said he had attended the appeal hearing and was “dismayed”.

Speaking at a town council meeting, he said: “It was horrendous what was going on there. The major problem was the five-year land supply which the inspector asked [about] and the office said, ‘No, we don’t have a land supply’ because it ran out at the end of March and from that point onwards they were kind of getting slaughtered.

“A few weeks later the district council found out that it had a 5.31-year land supply. If that figure had been put to the hearing I think we would have got a totally different answer on this appeal.”

Cllr Arlett said the town council should write to district council chief executive Mark Stone and Adrian Duffield, the head of planning, to ask why there was a delay.

Kester George, who chairs Harpsden Parish Council, said: “I think it is a disgraceful misuse of the planning system.

“Both Shiplake and Harpsden have met the targets imposed on them for housing without these 11 houses. This was only granted because of district council’s apparent inefficiency in showing that it had met its district housing target.

“What a rotten planning system when parish councils can be overruled even when they have done all they needed to do. The Government is to blame for having a planning system which is manifestly unfair, unjust and unreasonable.”

Councillor David Bartholomew, who represents Shiplake on the district council, said: “I am deeply unhappy that this was allowed on appeal despite being opposed locally. Our housing target has been exceeded many times over. The ongoing parish boundary quirk creates problems for everybody and has been exploited by developers.”

In 2017 planning inspector John Braithwaite announced he was overturning the district council’s decision to refuse planning permission to develop Thames Farm following a four-day public inquiry.

He said the district council couldn’t even demonstrate a three-year housing land supply, which the Government has deemed sufficient for a neighbourhood plan to remain enforceable.

The council disputed this but Mr Braithwaite said its estimate for the number of houses that would be built over the next few years was “too optimistic”.

In a statement, the district council said: “The council explained it had 5.33 years of housing land supply, as set out in its 2021 housing statement, which was correct at the time of the appeal hearing.

“The council reports on the housing land supply position once per year, in line with the national policy guidance issued by Government within the National Planning Policy Framework.

“All councils that do so use data drawn from the year ending April 1 for the preceding year and work to publish their position once the required analysis is complete.

“For many councils, the publication of this analysis occurs in the December/January, around nine months after the end of the period.

“South Oxfordshire District Council regularly publishes our position many months ahead of this and is frequently one of the first in the country to do so. At the point of publication, this becomes the ‘up-to-date’ housing land supply position for the council until the process is repeated and another one is published the following year.

“The council always has a published housing land supply position, as under national guidance it is always the most recent one published. The planning inspector was presented with a land supply position, which was the current one at the time of the appeal hearing.

“However, the inspector was critical that he was not supplied with a new position at the appeal hearing given it was available shortly after.

“The council explained that the information was the current published position in line with the Government’s requirements.

“The council provided the up-to-date housing supply position before the inspector’s decision, but he choose to disregard it. The council is disappointed with the wording used by the inspector. It is not reasonable for a council to simply rely on or issue data that it has not been analysed and confirmed.”