NEARLY 30 new mobile phone masts are planned for the district – close to schools, residential areas and busy high streets.

Five phone companies have applied to boost their signal power, and many have already been given planning permission to go ahead with new installations.

Details of the masts are in the annual ‘roll-out plan’ – a document submitted by Vodafone, Orange, T-Mobile, 3 and O2 – to the district council, pinpointing where they want to go, and masts under 15 metres high do not need formal permission.

In addition, councils are powerless to reject plans for masts on health grounds.

There are currently more than 100 masts across the district, and the proposals have been met with concern from people worried about potential health risks.

Woodredon Equestrian Centre, based in Waltham Abbey, is set to have two masts installed.

The 2012 Olympic training ground, which is leased from the City of London Corporation, is regularly used by pupils from Davenant Foundation School in Loughton, who visit the centre for riding lessons each week.

Owner Kevin Butchart said one phone mast had already been installed.

He added: “We were told from the day we came here that a mast would go up and we had no say in it. We were on holiday and when we came back we found it there.”

PTA member Raina Gee, of the Davenant School, said: “The masts are a big concern. I would never live anywhere near one. I have a backround in engineering so I know quite a bit about this sort of thing and I feel incredibly strongly about it.”

Another mast is proposed for Boarders Lane, near Oak View Special School in Loughton.

The school already has a mast on the site, which staff, governors and parents have been fighting to be removed, but Orange wants to build another.

Headteacher Sandra Winter said she feared it could put her pupils in danger.

She added: “It is so near to children who are already vulnerable and there's is a potential for risk.

"It’s still too near to the children and we could be worse off because it’s so close.”

In 2000 the Government commissioned the Stewart Report, to examine safety concerns over mobile phone masts.

The report, which still forms the basis of Government policy, concluded that there may be health risks posed by masts and advised against siting them next to schools.

But the Mobile Operators Association, which represents the five UK mobile network operators, played down concerns and pointed out a statement from the World Health Organisation fact sheet which said: "Considering the very low exposure levels and research results collected to date, there is no convincing scientific evidence that the weak RF signals from base stations and wireless networks cause adverse health effects."