A COMMUNITY is protesting against new housing proposals they say will ruin their village’s character and swamp an already overworked sewage network.

More than 1,000 signatures have been collected within a week opposing plans to build 269 more homes in Middleton St George, Darlington.

The applications come after outline planning permission was recently granted for 250 houses on land east of Sadberge Road, which will likely result in a 20 per cent increase in the local population.

Middleton St George Community Association chair Melissa Lane and resident Christine Thornley have led the protest campaign against the latest proposals.

They have been supported by scores of residents who have manned the community centre to help people submit more than 300 letters of objection to the applications.

Direct Signs of Darlington supplied a protest banner for free and hundreds of ‘No More Homes’ signs are springing up across the village.

Miss Lane praised the “phenomenal” support the campaign has received and said people were passionate about protecting their village from increases in population it cannot sustain.

She said: “We have not got the facilities or the road system to have more houses added to this village.

“We have a school that is oversubscribed, a sewage system that isn’t working adequately, a doctors’ surgery that is full to capacity and a road system that can’t take a big increase in the volume of traffic.”

Resident Rodger Sansom added: “Developers come along and put housing estates on to villages because it saves them all the infrastructure costs.

“They go away happy and clapping their hands together because they are making money, and Darlington Borough Council are clapping their hands together because they are getting their rate money.”

Sedgefield MP Phil Wilson is supporting the campaign and is meeting with Communities and Local Government under-secretary Stephen Williams on Tuesday to discuss the matter.

He will present the residents’ petition to parliament the following week and has lodged his own letters of objection to the applications

He said: “I understand the residents’ concerns and their worries around unsustainable development in Middleton St George and I will work with them to do what we can to prevent any development that is unsustainable.”

Middleton St George Parish Council and ward councillors Doris Jones and Steve York have continually fought hard against further development in the village.

They are creating a neighbourhood plan, a legal document setting out where the parish will allow development in future years, which is hoped will afford better protection for the village in the future.