From the Buckinghamshire Examiner
A BID for a permanent Gypsies and Traveller site in a village has been turned down on green belt grounds.
Families living on land at Alderbourne Cottage, Fulmer Lane, Fulmer, are to be given a deadline to move out.
South Bucks District Council’s planning committee voted on Wednesday last week to reject an application from Joe Rooney to change the use of the land to allow for two Gypsies and Traveller pitches.
The site has been occupied by Traveller families for some time and Mr Rooney made the bid to the council to make the arrangement permanent.
However, the application was turned down on the basis that the area is green belt land and cannot be developed on.
The council considered the fact that families are living on the site and that children there are registered at schools in the area.
However, the officer’s report on the application, which was studied by committee members before a decision was made, said: “Particular weight should be attached to the family’s lack of any permanent base prior to moving on to this site and their lack of an alternative site should they have to move from this site.
“However, I do not consider that these personal circumstances, when considered with the other factors outlined as counting in favour of this proposal, amount to outweigh the substantial harm to this part of the green belt.”
The application would have involved retaining an office, toilets, entrance gates and fencing for use by the people living on the site.
Speaking after the meeting, planning committee member Jennifer Woolveridge said: “The application was refused because it was just not sustainable on the green belt. That was the reason for us refusing it.”
The officer’s report into the application said ongoing occupation of the site following the refusal of planning permission is unlawful and that a period of time should be set for the area to be vacated by the family and for anything which has been built there since it was occupied to be removed.
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