Plans for 221 homes in Brook Meadows, Tiptree were submitted to Colchester Council last year. The application drew in hundreds of objections including residents, botanists from across the UK, the parish council, and the RSPB. A major issue was the ecological appraisal produced by Aspect Ecology, who allegedly presented the area as low-value scrubland. The report said: “The proposals have sought to minimise impacts and subject to the implementation of appropriate avoidance, mitigation and compensation measures, it is considered unlikely that the proposals will result in significant harm to biodiversity. “On the contrary, the opportunity exists to provide a number of biodiversity net gains as part of the proposals.”