The ‘vast’ amount of money required to defend a potential appeal against developers wanting to build 260 homes on land south of the A38 on the outskirts of Wellington could scupper their chances.

Members of Wellington Town Council have vehemently opposed controversial proposals by the Pegasus Group to develop 34 acres of land around Middle Green Farm off Oldway Road under the gaze of the Wellington Monument.

The plans were rejected by Somerset Council in April, but there is a strong possibility that Pegasus will appeal to a Government-backed inspector to have a look at the plans and overturn the refusal notice.

Last week the Weekly News reported – based on an official council report written by town council chief executive Dave Farrow – that Pegasus had already appealed against Somerset Council’s decision.

But Mr Farrow, speaking at the town council’s policy and finance committee on July 13, admitted it was an error on his part and Pegasus had not yet appealed and had until October 30 to do so.

Mr Farrow apologised to councillors and residents for the mistake and said he was “embarrassed.”

But he did say that they now had longer to prepare for any appeal which might or might not be lodged by Pegasus.

Councillors agreed that they should investigate fully a move to apply for “Rule 6” status which could give them the right to be represented at the appeal, depending on the procedure selected by the planning inspector.

If granted “Rule 6” status would allow the town council to become a formal participant in the appeal rather than simply an interested observer.

Although councillors have said they should investigate the possibility of “Rule 6”, they are wary that it would be a very expensive process.

Cllr John Thorne said: “If we’re serious about trying to stop this development, then it will mean we’ll have to spend a lot of money.

“Somerset Council hasn’t got the money to fight its way out of a paper bag at the moment, but if they don’t play their part I’m not sure we’d be able to stop it ourselves.

“Pegasus will be willing to spend millions getting this through and we just can’t spend that sort of money. We’ll be talking about crazy eye-watering sums of money.”

Cllr Keith Wheatley said the council needed to avoid making public declarations of intent at this stage until it knew exactly what was involved.

“We need to keep our powder dry,” he said. “We shouldn’t make any public declarations at this stage about dying on the hill at all costs.”

Cllr Mike McGuffie said that a detailed report should be prepared for the next meeting of full council to outline what they could do.

Earlier in the meeting Frank Sherlock, of the Protect Wellington campaign group, urged the council to apply for “Rule 6” status.

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He warned councillors that if the Pegasus development was given the go-ahead it would lead to a “tsunami wave” of developers coming forward with more housing projects.