TROUBLESHOOTING councillors have pledged to undertake an unprecedented nationwide audit of mobile phone mast applications in a radical attempt to block proposals for a 70ft mast in Watford.

In the past, Watford Council believed it could not turn down such applications on health grounds, but will now scour the country to find if any council has successfully done so.

The council also cannot turn down the application for a mast on land at British Waterways in Church Road on planning grounds, but councillors and residents fear the health risks caused by such masts and want to resist the development.

Councillors should have determined the phone company's application at Tuesday's development control meeting but deferred their decision and took the radical step of creating a working party that will cut across all other committees to gather evidence and information about telecommunications masts.

If sufficient evidence of legal precedent can be found where other councils have successfully banned the masts, then Watford will have a justifiable reason for rejecting the application by Telecom Securicor Cellular Radio, without fear of a costly appeal.

The proposed mast, which would be 70 feet from the back of a new housing development, Grange Close, and 100 feet from Nascot Wood Infants School, has sparked anger, fear and determination among residents, who have formed the Manor Road Anti-Mast Committee to fight it.

Councillor Jan Brown, for Nascot Ward who is not a member of the committee but was allowed to speak at the meeting, backed the calls by Councillor Sheila Jones for 'the council to take responsibility for its town'.

Councillor Brown said: 'Masts have been put up in a lot of places in the town but there is a great deal of unhappiness about them - people feel they are a possible detriment to health.

'I would ask this committee to stand up and be counted and delay all plans for masts to be built here until it has been proved if there is a danger to health.'

Councillor Paul Harrison added: 'It is a tremendous dilemma as we have to bear in mind there is advice from the Government on the safety of these masts.

'But I remember back in the 1950s when the debate was about smoking. It was not until 20 years later, when smokers were suffering ill health, that it was finally proved.

The news has delighted campaigners who have bombarded committee members with letters, a petition signed by more than 800 people and distributed leaflets - 161 of which have been signed and passed to the council - reiterating their concerns.

Just before Tuesday's meeting, residents demonstrated outside Watford Town Hall before taking their placards into the meeting where they were congratulated by the chairman, councillor Rashid Choudary, on behalf of his colleagues, for all the work they had done.

Mr Brian Samms, chairman of the Manor Road Anti-Mast Committee, said: 'We are very pleased and we welcome the council's decision to investigate further.

'We believe the council should be able to dismiss this application on health and environmental grounds and we are hoping this group will be find out the dangers and, hopefully, it will allay the fears among us all.'

Council leader Vince Muspratt urged the committee and residents to be cautious about the role of the working group. He said: 'It would be wrong of us to let the residents leave here thinking the working group now had the power to turn down this application.

'We need to get this done before the company makes an appeal.'

'If there are no legal precedents then we will have no grounds to reject it as the case is very, very weak now. The Government has made it quite clear that it does not find these masts to be a hazard to health.'

A spokesman for Aldenham Parish Council, which is faced with an application to build a mast in Phillimore Recreation Park in Radlett, welcomed the move by Watford Council.

She said: 'In our situation, we are different. The site is on private land and we are the landlords so we are able to refuse it.

'However, we are pleased Watford is making this move as their findings will be of value to us.'