TWO thirds of responses sent to a website set up to receive residents’ views on a key housing development were spam, it can be revealed.

Homes England (HE) wants to build 3,000 homes at Chalgrove Airfield.

That is despite massive opposition from villagers and multinational ejector seat firm Martin-Baker, which is based at the site.

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Last June, HE launched its website to get people’s views on the potential development about 12 miles south-east of Oxford, alongside a series of consultation events.

The agency said it has so far received a total of 15 responses on the website, chalgroveairfield.com.

But of those, just five were genuine comments from members of the public.

Oxford Mail:

The rest were unsolicited emails advertising ‘loans without credit’, ‘direct lender installment [sic] loans’ or other irrelevant messages.

An opponent to building homes at Chalgrove Airfield said he was ‘not surprised’ by the lack of interest generated by Homes England.

In a Freedom of Information request, the agency refused to say how much it had paid consultants Carter Jonas to set up and maintain the website, along with other work on the airfield project.

It claimed to do so would ‘prejudice the commercial interests of the organisation and of Carter Jonas’.

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The agency returned the request weeks late – far exceeding the statutory 20 working day limit for Freedom of Information requests.

It only arrived after several prompts to the agency, including tweets and emails.

South Oxfordshire District Council supports building on the airfield. It has included the proposal in its Local Plan, which was approved by councillors in December. It is the only one of seven proposed strategic sites that would not be built on the Oxford Green Belt.

Paul Boone, chairman of the Chalgrove Airfield Action Group, said: “I’m not surprised at all unfortunately. I think it’s indicative of how [Homes England] have been throughout.”

Oxford Mail:

He added: “They waltz in, do what they saying they are going to do and waltz out.

“I am sure in the UK somewhere they are doing good things but here, no.”

Homes England received another 127 comments on the plan last year during its consultation. The vast majority of them were negative.

The agency was told its plan was ‘frankly laughable’, and to stop working on its ‘blinkered view of a mythical Nirvana’.

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Another respondent said they would be moving to Somerset if building started.

Only one of the 127 comments appeared to be in favour of the project.

Last year, Oxfordshire County Council’s highways department was opposed to the airfield plan. It said a mooted £90m budget for highways was about half of what would be needed.

Yesterday, it said it was ‘not in a position to comment’ on whether it had changed its mind and would wait until the Local Plan process is complete.