Residents who attended their town hall with the hope of stopping an “ill-fitting and unsustainable” housing development left disappointed.

Members of the Tunbridge Wells planning committee voted by five votes to three to accept their officers’ recommendation to approve a proposal for 120 homes at Bassetts Farm in Horsmonden.

Earlier the committee heard representations from six members of the public, two parish councils and two ward councillors urging that the application be refused.

Andy Winser, representing the Bassetts Farm Forum residents group, insisted the scheme conflicted with the Horsmonden Neighbourhood Plan by proposing development outside the village’s limit to built development.

He said: “Also the house densities do not reflect those in the Neighbourhood Plan - a scheme for 89 units (not 120) would be consistent.”

Cllr Matt Richards, of Horsmonden Parish Council, said the village’s carefully considered Neighbourhood Plan was “being ignored.” He said the scheme would put excessive pressure on the village infrastructure and was “ill-fitting and unsustainable development.”

Cllr Elizabeth Akenhead, of Brenchely and Matfield Parish Council, was concerned about the knock-on effect that traffic from the new development would have on her villages and said the developer should be obliged to make payments towards traffic mitigation measures there.

Ward councillor David Knight (TWA), who does not sit on the planning committee, said that 120 homes was “very excessive” and land proposed for a medical centre was in the wrong place. He also said the local sewage capacity could not cope now and adding extra homes would increase the risk of foul-sewage flooding.

Ward councillor Tom Mobbs (Con), also not a member of the planning committee, described the scheme as being of a “significantly higher density” than the rest of the village and said: “I cannot accept this destruction of our village.”

However, David Huggett, a group director with the developer, Persimmon Homes, said that new homes were needed. He said: “The average house price in the borough of Tunbridge Wells is £463,000. In Horsmonden, it is £555,000.”

He promised a local homes guarantee - that for six months property sales would be reserved for those with a Horsmonden connection.

The firm’s planning consultant Judith Aston, added that unusually all the 48 affordable homes proposed as part of the development would be houses with their own gardens (as opposed to flats).

She said that as Horsmonden was one of the few places in the borough “unfettered by the greenbelt” it was inevitable that housing development would occur there.

When it came to the vote, all councillors expressed their sympathy with residents, but only Cllr Christian Atwood said strongly: “There is opposition from the residents group, two parish councils, ward members and a former MP (Greg Clark). We need to listen to them and I can’t support this.”

But Cllr David Osborne said: “We recognise the local concerns, but should we refuse this, the developer would appeal and then we would spend a significant amount of time and money defending our decision and still ultimately lose.”

The committee chairman, Cllr Hugh Patterson, reminded members that Tunbridge Wells had only a 3.9-year housing land supply - with the government requiring all boroughs to have five years.

Those voting for the application were Cllrs Hugh Patterson (Lib Dem), Alex Britcher-Allan (Lab), Don Kent (Lib Dem), Brendon le Page (Lib Dem) and David Osborne (Lib Dem).

Those against were: Cllrs Christian Atwood (Con), Adrian Pitts (Lib Dem) and Lynne Darragh (Con).

There had been 261 letters of objection against the development.

The site is allocated for development in the Tunbridge Wells emerging Local Plan.

Find out about planning applications that affect you at the Public Notice Portal.

Details of the Persimmon application can be found on the Tunbridge Wells council website, under application reference number 24/00078.