IN THE past year, Kingston Bagpuize villagers have had to accept more than 200 new houses they did not want.

Now an application has gone in that they have welcomed.

The owner of Kingston Bagpuize House and the owners of a small industrial estate have combined to draw up plans for 22 homes next to the estate.

As part of the plan they would give £375,000 to the cricket and football clubs next door, who would be able to rebuild their dilapidated 1960’s clubhouse and create a new football pitch.

Manda Thompson, who helps manage three football teams at the club, said: “It is the best plan we have had in the village for a long time.

“The clubhouse, if I could call it that, is beyond a revamp. There are holes in the floor and in the winter it is warmer to stand outside.”

She said other housing plans in the village and nearby Southmoor were “madness”.

In the past year, Vale of White Horse District Council has given permission for 98 new homes on Draycott Road, Southmoor, 108 homes on Witney Road Southmoor and 50 homes on Faringdon Road.

But the council said that the initial application for 50 homes next to the sports club, submitted in September last year, was unsuitable as it was too far outside the village.

A second application to build 12 homes there submitted in February this year is still active and due to be decided in January. This application for 22 home is designed as an alternative to that plan.

Kingston Bagpuize and Southmoor Parish Council has backed the scheme.

Council leader Brian Forster said: “Because of the intransigence of the planning committee at the Vale the one project that we want to happen is now two years behind where it should be.”

The landowners’ consultant on the application, Ken Dijksman, is the man behind plans for a 30,000-home Oxford Garden City between Abingdon and the Hanneys.

In this, the third submission of the plans, he has specified there would be 13 affordable homes, to help meet Vale’s need for affordable housing.

Southmoor and Kingston Bagpuize parish council asked independent charity the Oxfordshire Playing Fields Association (OPFA) to cast an eye over the proposal.

It said that the sports field is a valuable community facility, “very well used” by the cricket and football clubs and recommended its approval.

The £350,000 cost of a new clubhouse would be met by the developer.

October 16 is the deadline for public comments. Vale of White Horse planners will decide on March 4 next year.