The council has still not submitted its plans for 11,400 new homes.

After a draft document outlining where the properties would be built across the area was approved on December 14 by Epping Forest District Council, officers finalised details for the submission version of its Local Plan in March.

The Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government is yet to gets it hands on the document however, after CK Property took the council to the High Court of Justice.

Although the judge dismissed the development company's claims that its building bid had been unfairly excluded, it has since taken the case to the High Court and, following rejection there, the Court of Appeal.

With the challenge still in court, an injunction stopping submission of the plan remains in place.

Nigel Richardson, assistant director of development management, said: "It is extremely frustrating.

"The Court of Appeals does not look at things as speedily as perhaps the other courts.

"In the meantime the injunction remains in place."

If the final version of the Local Plan is not submitted by January 2019, the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, James Brokenshire, could add thousands more homes to the district's requirement.