TIMING is everything, so we are told. And it is impossible not to think of this old adage when it comes to the case of Worcester City Council and the future of the Kays site.

It’s not that those good people at the Guildhall dithered and therefore pushed a firm of housing developers into the arms of the Whitehall bureaucracy. It’s more a case of making a decision that effectively decided to do nothing.

This newspaper has some sympathy with the council’s dilemma. Britain is experiencing a serious downturn and the argument that there’s no point in releasing land for employment use is convincing.

To be brutally frank, just where would all these jobs come from – and without the work, what’s the point of building homes for people who won’t be coming to Worcester?

The developers don’t see it like this. They say that while there are no realistic prospects of employment use, by building homes there would be no adverse consequences to existing land supply. That’s why they’ve appealed to the planning inspectorate.

The problem now is that while we have some sympathy for the idea of houses being built on a brownfield site, thus relieving the pressure on our dwindling green spaces, what price local democracy? True, it could be argued that the council’s legal team might have seen this one coming, but the fact remains that any decision has now been taken out of the hands of our elected representatives.

Yes, we want more houses. But not at the price that’s being asked.