The Liberal Democrat group at Uttlesford District Council has accused the Conservatives of "needless and cynical politicking" over the Local Plan timetable.
The criticism came in response to a letter by Michael Gove, the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, to council leader Cllr Petrina Lees, warning them to keep to the timetable for submission of the plan.
Cllr Geoffrey Sell, leader of the Lib Dem group, said: "If the R4U administration stick to their timetable agreed in July 2022, Uttlesford will submit the draft Local Plan to the Planning Inspectorate for examination well before the June 2025 deadline.
"The failure to have a local plan has cost Uttlesford residents dearly. Since 2021, under the R4U administration, Uttlesford have granted planning permissions and seen homes built which together amount for well over half of the 13,680 homes target.
"Much of this is speculative development without the necessary infrastructure.
"It is a bit rich of the Tory group, who voted against going out to consultation on the recent Reg18 draft this autumn which would have delayed completion of the final draft by months, to now jump on Michael Gove’s bandwagon by requesting an extraordinary council meeting on the January 17 to discuss the SoS letter which has been all about keeping to the agreed timetable."
Smita Rajesh, the Lib Dem parliamentary candidate for the North West Essex constituency, said: "The Secretary of State's letter is clear evidence that this Conservative government is against democratically elected councils exercising their powers and is looking for an excuse to take these decisions away from the representatives that Uttlesford residents elected."
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However leader of the Conservative group, Cllr Susan Barker, explained that she called the extraordinary meeting so the conversation could take place in public.
She said: "The reason I called the meeting was to get the response from the council to Mr Gove in the public domain.
"One of the reasons the Local Plan we are putting through at the moment is all wrong is because we have so many houses already allocated.
"We've got enough houses for the next five or six years."
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