TRADING Standards have criticised Hyndburn's Local Plan for being mistake ridden and faulty and said that civil action could be taken against the borough council.

Planning chiefs have been accused of giving developers a free-hand to build on public open spaces and environmental protected land because of the errors.

The local plan contains more than 130 mistakes on around 80 sites that planning chiefs said were incorrectly identified as protected open space and or biological and heritage sites.

These corrections, and removal of their protected status, were informally accepted by the development services committee in September 2000, to be formally accepted in the new Local Plan in 2006.

Jack Houldsworth, of Larch Road, Oswaldtwistle, who has fought the council over plans to build homes on a similar piece of land near his home, said this would create a precedent for all the other 80 sites.

The Local Plan, which costs £20, shows a map of the borough indicating such things as green belt, industrial land or sites of biological interest. The borough's planning office is currently analysing the findings of their consultation period to draw up the new plan.

The finding by Trading Standards follows an inquiry by Mr Houldsworth in 1999 after he wrote to them during his fight to keep the developers off the piece of land on Larch Road.

The ongoing battle was passed on to the Government's North West regional office for final approval after the development services committee gave planning permission for two new houses last month. It was passed to the regional office because the decision deviated from the Local Plan -- it is still a protected public space.

Mr Houldsworth said: "I received the letter from Trading Standards after I wrote to them querying the mistakes on the Local Plan. They said it was faulty and mistake-ridden.

"The council have informally adopted these mistakes through advice from the planning department. I don't know why they have done this, but what it means is that it could set a precedent where we will lose a lot of sites that should be protected."

Jason O'Rourke, Fair Trading Officer, said: "The inaccuracies in the Local Plan make it of unsatisfactory quality and as such 'faulty'. Residents do have the right to take civil action against Hyndburn Borough Council. Any action would be for the cost of the Plan (£20) and any costs they may have incurred."

Amanda Maxim, principal officer of Trading Standards at County Hall, today reiterated the point. She said: "If the plan is still inaccurate then our advice would still stand. There would be a right to civil action." but it would not be something we would normally get involved in because there is no criminal conviction of trading standards law."

Brendan Lyons, Hyndburn's chief planning and transportation officer, said: "The proposals map of the Local Plan was not completely accurate because it showed some parts which were open space when they shouldn't have been.

"One example was land near Larch Road, where the land went through people's gardens.

"We realised that was a mistake and we corrected that by checking up on all of the open spaces on the plan and it came to our attention."