The leader of Norfolk County Council has accused government advisors of "rushing through" new guidance on protected bats to intentionally put the Norwich Western Link road at risk.
Kay Mason Billig made the claim as frustrated councillors reluctantly agreed to pause the planning process and reduce spending on the hugely controversial £274m scheme.
Officials acknowledged the 3.9-mile road, to connect the Northern Distributor Road to the A47 west of Norwich, has little chance of happening after opposition from government advisor Natural England created a "significant impediment".
The organisation informed the council in March that it was unlikely to award the environmental licence needed to disturb protected barbastelle bats on the road's route.
That came just days after Natural England published new guidelines around the mammals, which found barbastelle bats were not thriving in the UK to a degree which would have allowed them to be granted favourable conservation status.
The organisation said there was "no known mitigation or compensation" for loss of barbastelle roosting habitat in the short to medium term.
That is a potentially knock out blow for the Norwich Western Link plans, with officers having previously believed £35m of environmental mitigation measures would secure the licence.
And Mrs Mason Billig said, of the new guidance: "I think it was rushed out and was rushed out because of the scheme we had on the table. That is the way it is looking.
"I think we have been open and honest with Natural England, but it does not appear to have been a two-way street."
Mrs Mason Billig pointed to documents the council had obtained from Natural England, using the Freedom Of Information Act.
The council said it had been awaiting a response to its draft environmental licence by the end of February, so it could lodge the planning application for the Western Link.
In mid March, the new guidelines were published and Natural England told the council it was unlikely to award the necessary licence for the Western Link.
But the FOI request revealed a Natural England document about the new guidelines stated: "The publication is timely due to casework in Norfolk; we wanted to publish this before we received a planning application. We were delayed waiting for a relevant paper to be published."
Mrs Mason Billig said: "The information gathered from the FOI shows there seems to have been some collusion going on behind the scenes. to push the new guidance out before they had to respond to us.
"I said in March that the timing of it stinks and I think I have been proved right."
The council has called for the transport secretary and environment secretary to speak to each other and intervene to get the road built.
READ MORE: Norfolk MPs at loggerheads over fate of Western Link
Mrs Mason Billig said: "I hope the Department for Transport win this battle, and if they have to get in a room to arm wrestle, then so be it.
"We find ourselves in an invidious position. We cannot go forwards and we cannot go backwards.
"We have to pause the process and wait for this government to to work out what it wants."
Bill Borrett, cabinet member for public health, who represents Mattishall and Elmham, said Natural England had "led the council down a path" of believing the environment mitigation to be acceptable, only to delay a final decision and to then change tack.
He said: "It just strikes me as not only being duplicitous, but not proceeding in good faith. This is the taxpayer who will foot the bill for all this. This is a scandalous waste of public money for Natural England to behave like this.
"I plea for the two government ministers responsible for the two departments to sort this out, because if they don't it will be the people of Norfolk who suffer."
READ MORE: Villagers back Norwich Western Link road intervention plea
However Natural England, which has also objected to the road on planning grounds, said the council had access to its report on favourable conservation status for barbastelle bats before it was published in March.
A spokesman said: "Decisions to grant or deny planning applications are ultimately matters for local authorities.
“Natural England is clear that development and nature can go hand in hand and are committed to making that happen.
"But that includes ensuring our most precious wildlife is protected from irreversible harm.
"Barbastelle bats are incredibly rare and are found only in mature woodland that can’t be recreated elsewhere.
"The proposed route for the Norwich Western Link Road would destroy one of the largest remaining populations in the UK.
"We cannot see how the proposed road would not destroy the bats’ habitat even if there was mitigation in place, so we have objected to this planning application, which will also risk harm to important wildlife sites.
“We have worked closely with Norfolk County Council for more than four years on the proposed Norwich Western Link Road and consistently advised on our significant concerns."
And Steve Morphew, leader of the Labour group at County Hall, said: "This is an extraordinarily myopic, self righteous rewriting of history.
"The Conservative administration have created this problem and are desperate to convince others they are not guilty.
"How many times have we called for a Plan B and been ignored? Blaming Natural England won't wash."
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