WINCHESTER phone mast campaigners have launched a new offensive.

Residents, who have fought the plans for Byron Avenue for more than three years, are now battling proposals for an enlarged 20-metre mast at nearby Sarum Road.

Hutchison 3g wants to replace a 15-metre mast with one five metres taller at the Sarum Road reservoir.

Campaigners have accused the city council of not doing enough to tell the public about the scheme and will turn out in force at the planning committee tomorrow that considers the issue.

Karen Barratt, a veteran anti-mast campaigner, said the council was trying to muzzle dissent. She said opponents had been told that no objectors would be allowed to speak at the meeting because their views had been expressed at a sub-committee on August 25.

Mrs Barratt said: "It would be outrageous. We will attend the meeting and try to speak."

City councillor Ray Love, whose ward includes Byron Avenue and Sarum Road, said: "Something as important as this you shouldn't stifle debate."

Councillor Geoff Bennetts, who chaired the August 25 meeting, denied dissenting voices were being stifled.

Mr Bennetts said; "If given a fair hearing at a sub-committee, it is quite common for them not to have a second go, otherwise it would create difficulties with every meeting. We have given everybody a fair hearing."

Mrs Barratt said there was wider issue about consultation. The proposed Sarum Road mast was in effect a new mast and so there should have been much wider consultation. Letters were sent to nearby homes over the summer holiday but no orange posters were put up to alert people who live further away but may still feel they are affected by the plan.

"This is precisely the sort of thing that shows the current system is not working," said Mrs Barratt.