RESIDENTS across Dorset are set to learn which spots have been earmarked as potential authorised sites for travellers.

Nine local councils in Dorset banded together three years ago to spend an estimated £250,000 on tackling the controversial issue by hiring private consultants to look at potential sites.

Baker Associates has now reported back and its findings will become public in the next days or weeks.

The locations of the first suggested sites, for West Dorset, will be made public today. A full public consultation is due to begin across the county in November. Meanwhile, the councils are waiting to hear whether the government will remove the legal requirement for them to find a set number of authorised pitches for travellers.

The previous government’s Regional Spatial Strategy required councils to find a set number of pitches for travellers by 2011 – in Poole’s case, 35 residential pitches and eight transit pitches.

But the spatial strategies were suspended by the coalition government pending the publication of its Localism Bill in the autumn.

The county’s development plan aims to allocate permanent and transit sites for gypsies, travellers and travelling show people across Dorset for the next 15 years.

The government says councils will be responsible for assessing and meeting the needs of their communities, including traveller site provision.