NEW laws are needed to deal with unlawful gypsy traveller sites.

That is one of the findings presented by council leaders and chief executives in a letter to Minister for Decentralisation, Greg Clarke MP.

The news has been welcomed by Well Hill resident Phil Hobson, who will be fighting a planning appeal next month brought by travellers who parked up on green belt land near his home last year.

Mr Hobson said: "What has been done is a good first move, but it needs to be stronger than that.

"If we're going to protect the countryside from inappropriate development we've got to be a lot stronger in terms of planning policy."

Mr Hobson called for Circular 01/06, which was introduced by former deputy prime minister John Prescott and set out rules on the provision of gypsy traveller sites to be followed by councils, to be scrapped.

"If they revoked this it would actually make the situation a lot better," Mr Hobson said.

The Cash traveller family did eventually put in a planning application for two static mobile homes and four caravans, but only after they set up home in the Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty near Redmans Lane last year.

When Sevenoaks District Council refused permission they appealed.

Under planning law they are allowed to remain on the site until the Planning Inspectorate's appeal decision is made public.

Illegal traveller sites have proved to be a sensitive topic across the district.

More than 200 people in Otford objected when a family set up home in Telston Lane last summer.

Villagers clubbed together to buy up six acres of land nearby to stop any further development earlier in the year.

Sevenoaks MP Michael Fallon has added his voice of support to Mr Clarke's letter.

"My view has always been travellers should obey the same planning rules as everybody else and there should be no more special favours for them," he said.

"They shouldn't be regarded as a special minority with different human rights to the rest of us."

The letter says councils are increasingly having to deal with development undertaken without planning permission and calls for new procedures.

SDC chief executive Robin Hales and Kent County Council leader Paul Carter were among those who signed it.

They also want to see an end to people in the settled community building without first obtaining planning permission.

They claim people who breach planning law often apply for permission retrospectively.

The letter read: "In doing so, applicants can seek to gain consent for a building, feature or structure which may not normally be approved."