Campaigners call for planning permission delay over homes at £550,000 site in Shrewsbury
Campaigners involved in a row over land wrongfully sold for £550,000 are calling for a planning permission extension to be delayed.
Permission for homes on land within Greenfields Recreation Ground in Shrewsbury is due to expire next week. It is not currently on any planning committee meeting agendas.
The land was sold by Shrewsbury Town Council to CSE Developments in 2017, and has been subject of a legal battle which is due to end up in the Supreme Court this December. The land should have been kept for community use.
In June, following an independent review conducted by Michael Redfern KC, the town council “unreservedly apologised” over the sale, and vowed to try and return the land to the community.
Greenfields Community Group have now raised concerns over a planning revocation document from 2018 in which a senior planning officer said: “The land was not and is not considered to be part of Greenfields Recreation Ground or public open space”.
They also disagree with correspondence from the developer, who said: “I have grown up in Greenfields and have lived in the locality all my life. For as long as I can remember, this piece of land has never been maintained as parkland. I have also spoken to older residents in Greenfields who even prior to my memory say it has never formed part of the park.”
Dr Peter Day, who has led the legal challenge, said: “Questions need to be asked. This information needs to be reviewed. The judicial review said it was not possible to come to the conclusion that it wasn’t public land.”
He added: “It is without question that the public were still using the land even after CSE had purchased it. And it was accessed in 2018.”
In June, the town council vowed to try and return the land to the community, however in August, leader Alan Mosley said the authority had been advised “unequivocally” by a planning barrister to delay any mediation or discussion with the developer until after the Supreme Court hearing in December.
The council is split on the issue. When members voted on whether or not to go to the negotiating table before the Supreme Court date, the vote was tied 4-4, with leader Mr Mosley using his casting vote to delay discussions.
Mr Redfern, described feeling “a certain vibration” from councillors and “a temperature” from campaigners when he presented his findings at the extraordinary public meeting in June. He urged both parties to try and come to an agreement to avoid “huge” legal fees that could run into hundreds of thousands of pounds.
He also insisted that CSE Developments was “an innocent party” which did not know about the complex history and legal status of the land, and that the company had been “subjected to abuse which must stop” over the conflict.
Mr Redfern also said his investigation found “no criminality” involved on the town council’s part, and that the health and wellbeing of some staff and members had suffered due to stress over the row.
Greenfields Community Group has been fighting for the land to be returned for several years, and has so far paid around £60,000 towards a judicial review and to have the case heard in the Court of Appeal.
Members are aiming to raise in the region of £40,000 for their next big legal hearing.
