by Kerenza Moore

A FARMER has submitted plans to erect a large shed on the same piece of land where his proposal for a new house was refused.

Chris Wilton put in a “prior notification of agricultural development” application to Cornwall Council for a shed to house straw bales and farm machinery on a plot of land he owns at Ramehead Lane on the Rame Peninsula.

This small plot is next to Penmillard Farm, which is leased from the Mount Edgcumbe Estate and has been farmed by the Wilton family for more than 200 years.

Storage

The planning statement submitted to the local authority states that the new shed will be around 293 square metres and just under 5.5 metres high to the eaves “with a shallow roof pitch of 15 degrees, to minimise its height while maximising its functionality”.

It reads: “The farm urgently needs storage for machinery and straw.

“We currently have over 200 bales stored outside deteriorating in the weather, as well as many of our farm implements, as there is nowhere undercover to store them….

“Although we have a primary shed on the farm, this was lost to fire and we are still awaiting its reconstruction”.

Mr Wilton’s attempts to build a house on the Ramehead Lane site have led to a costly planning wrangle.

After Cornwall Council’s East planning committee originally allowed the scheme in August 2020, a Judicial Review was mounted by local campaigners, challenging how the Council had gone about the process: the review quashed the committee’s decision.

Mr Wilton put in his application again in 2021, and this time round it was refused by the planning committee; his appeal against this negative decision was refused by the planning inspectorate in September 2022.

At that time, the inspector stated that the proposal would not fulfil the requirement of development within an Area Of Outstanding Natural Beauty to “conserve or enhance the landscape character and natural beauty of the AONB”.

Local resident and environmentalist Tonny Steenhagen was part of a group who mounted their own Judicial Reviews back in 2014 and 2016, a challenge which eventually put a halt to the dumping of dredged silt into Whitsand Bay.

He was not part of the group which mounted the Wilton Judicial Review, but says he supported it because of his desire to see the beauty of the area preserved.

He has closely followed the progress of the case and reported upon it on a local Facebook Page.

He said: “I’d hoped we’d seen the last of the Rame Head Planning saga, but the same applicant has decided to put in another application for exactly the same location; this time however for a massive shed.

Cynical

It is difficult to see this other than a cynical “two fingers up” to those who spent two years trying to protect the Rame Head Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONB), given the applicant threatened to do just something like this if he didn’t get his family house nearly two years ago.”

Mr Steenhagen is referring to a conversation on Facebook in February 2021, where Mr Wilton stated that “whichever way it goes, there will either be a modest house, or something much, much larger which won’t need planning, but I guess that’s what you get (smiling emoji).”

Responding to the other participant in the conversation, Mr Wilton then goes on to say “Not many farming operations need planning permission, and some things we do are much larger than a recessed house (two laughing emojis and two thumbs up emojis)”

While new sheds for farming purposes do regularly and legally go through without a full planning application, sometimes the Council will decide that the applicant must go through the full process.

Cornwall Council has determined that a planning application is required in this instance.

The officer’s report states: “It has not been suitably demonstrated that the proposal would be carried out on agricultural land.

“Even if the land were demonstrated to comprise agricultural land, prior approval of the siting, design and external appearance of the building would have been required in order to assess any potential impacts on the sensitive landscape setting.”

The plan can be viewed on Cornwall Council’s online planning register by using the reference PA22/09821.