VILLAGERS have packed out a public meeting to try to learn details of a rumoured 100 home development on fields north of Chillington.

Villagers told Acorn Property Group planning director Duncan Powell that they did not want any more development.

But Mr Powell told the standing room only meeting that he would not be there if he wasn't confident the scheme would go ahead, although they were looking at 'up to 70' homes.

He emphasised that no definite figure had been decided for the development, on three fields immediately north of Green Park Way.

While plans were in the very early stages, pre-application proposals had recently been submitted to South Hams Council, he said.

Stokenham Parish Council chairman Piers Spence said the meeting was taking place at an unusually early stage in the process and they were 'in at the ground floor'.

He said that while Acorn had requested a private meeting with the council, as was usual in these cases, he had insisted on the meeting being open to the public as 'rumours were rife' in the parish.

It was to the company's credit, he said, that they had agreed.

Mr Powell told the meeting that Acorn was not 'a volume housebuilder', and did not have a standard design of home.

He said the company believed that in the UK new build housing was generic and generally quite poor.

But he added: 'That's not us. We're better than all the others.'

Mr Powell and his team fielded questions from the vocal crowd.

For more on this story, see this week's Kingsbridge & Salcombe Gazette