Planners have agreed that they cannot object to an upmarket fish business dubbed 'the Chaxhill Stink' because it is too smelly.

A public inquiry heard that the Forest of Dean District Council no longer wanted to stop plans by the Severn and Wye Smokery because of fishy odours.

But they are still arguing that plans for the Smokery, which supplies the Ritz Hotel, to create two large lagoons do not fit in with the local landscape.

During a long-running saga which dates back to April 2011, councillors blocked plans for two new water treatment plants and retrospective planning permission for changes to the business premises on the side of the A48.

Reasons included odours endured by people living nearby and the impact on the local countryside.

But this week, district council lawyer Jack Smyth said that following a report by their consultants Broomfield, the council would only be objecting on landscape grounds.

He told the public inquiry at the Coleford council HQ: "After changes to the scheme and extra evidence, odours are unlikely to cause material harm.

"There will always be some odour, but we are objecting purely on landscape grounds."

But neighbours told inspector David Wildsmith that smells were still an issue for them.

Farmer Bob Hyslop, of Chaxhill House, challenged the firm's green credentials by saying it had failed to clean up a polluted brook and discharged waste into watercourses that leaked into an SSSI and Ramsar site. He said neighbours also feared that the company would grow or move and sell the land for housing.

"I feel we are going back to the days of the Victorian cess pool and the smell would not be very pleasant," he said.

"Also I would like to show you two sites where the tankers take the effluent which ends up in an SSSI Ramsar site."

But Mr Cook's barrister, Christopher Boyle said the council's own consultants agreed that odour was not a major problem and the waste plant was so effective live fish could swim in the finished water.

He said all agreed the company was worth £2.6 million to the local economy, employed 240 staff and had a turnover of £30 million.

The inquiry is expected to last until the end of the week.