Rural house can be occupied by non-farmers

A Herefordshire widow has been told that a rule requiring her house to be occupied by a farmer no longer applies.

The dormer bungalow Cwm Derw at Quarry Farm near Dorstone in the southwest of the county could only be occupied by someone working locally in agriculture or forestry, their dependants, widow or widower, according to the original 1986 planning permission.

But a Mr and Mrs Handley had lived there, despite neither working on the land, since 1999, according to Mrs Handley’s application to Herefordshire Council, which sought a certificate of lawfulness confirming the condition could no longer be enforced.

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Under planning law, this can be issued if the breach has continued for over ten years – but the burden of proof is on the applicant to show this.

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The late Mr Handley had “always” worked as a carpenter, while Mrs Handley “has mainly been a housewife” – though the couple had kept Highland cattle “as a hobby” and were “not real farmers”, her application said.

Planning officer Tracey Meachen has now agreed that the cattle “have never been part of an agricultural business that rears cattle for the purposes of producing meat, milk or leather from the hide”.

With no contrary evidence having been put forward, she concluded that the current, non-agricultural occupancy of the house “is lawful given that the time in which enforcement action could be taken has now expired”.