Senior conservatives have called on the government to reverse its decision to water down local housing targets in the wake of poor local election results that saw Tories lose key councils despite delaying controversial local plan proposals.

Michael Gove’s own constituency authority, Surrey Heath, was among a number of home counties authorities to fall to the Liberal Democrats in last Thursday’s poll, despite the authority having paused its plan-making efforts in the wake of the government’s planning policy climbdown.

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