Two new traveller sites are to be built in Birmingham on land that should be set aside for housing local people, it has been claimed.
Details of the brace of new sites are outlined in the city council's new Birmingham Development Plan - the document which explains how the city will grow and develop over the next two decades.
But opposition Conservative housing spokesman John Lines has described the decision to release the former industrial land in Aston for traveller camps as "barmy".
The city already has one official traveller camp at Tameside Drive, in Castle Vale, but it has been occupied by a single family - the Dohertys - and their caravans for more than a decade, despite several attempts by the council to evict them.
Now, the Labour-run council wants to release land at the corner of Hubert Street and Aston Broad Steet East, and at the junction of Rupert Street and Proctor Street, for development as an official camp.
The first site would have four caravan pitches, the second, which is currently a car park, ten to 15 pitches.
Council bosses hope the official sites will end the scourge of unofficial traveller camps, such as the successive invasions at Woodgate Valley Country Park.
Not only do the council and police have to evict the caravans but they are also often left with clean-up and repair work afterwards.
Coun Lines (Con Bartley Green) said: "They are giving our land over to these itinerant people who just pass through and don't pay into the system.
"Our people have been subjected to regular invasions by these individuals and are being rewarded by this Labour council with more land.
"You couldn't make it up. We need these sites to build houses for Brummies. They have one site at Castle Vale but it has been seized by one family and the council won't take it back.
"At the same time, there are whole chunks of the green belt being given over to housing development."
The development plan outlines sites for up to 51,000 homes to be built in Birmingham, including 6,000 on the green belt at Langley to the east of Sutton Coldfield.
But the plan estimates there will be demand for 89,000 homes and the council hopes neighbouring boroughs will be able to accommodate the remaining growth.
The plan states a total of 59 council-owned sites were considered but "the two sites proposed for allocation are those considered to be realistic and suitable," the report read.
