The go-ahead has been given to convert a building in the grounds of a Herefordshire castle into a residential home for troubled children.

Kinsman Residential Homes of Merthyr Tydfil had applied to convert Bronsil House, an unoccupied former office building on the Eastnor Castle estate near Ledbury.

It plans “long-term, non-institutional, family-style living” at the home, helping up to six children aged 10-17 at a time “recover from experiences of trauma and significant social disruption”, it application said.

This did not receive any comment from either Eastnor parish council nor any local residents.

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Planning officer Emily Brookes concluded that the plan “is compatible with surrounding uses, would present no harm to the surrounding landscape nor the highway network, and would support the sustainable reuse of a building”.

A condition was included at the request of the council’s ecology officer requiring separate permission for any external lighting on the buiding, given the estate is home to several bat species.

The open wooded pasture of the Eastnor Castle grounds is a grade II registered parkland.