"I have just spent five years of hell because of the Planning Department"

Friday 08 June 2018

A man who was fined £50,000 by Royal Court after he carried out unauthorised work on his house in St. Mary has told an official complaints panel that the Planning Department made his life "hell" because of an alleged vendetta.

Ivor Barette's planning application to renovate his house, Broughton Lodge Farm, was approved in 2012 but the Planning Department took issue with the removal of windows and floorboards as the house was a listed building.

At a hearing of the States Complaints Board, heard by Deputy Chairman, Stuart Catchpole QC, Janice Eden and Graeme Marett, Mr Barette explained the renovation of the main house was part of a whole farm project. 

By the time he submitted the application for the main house, he said he had already renovated the outbuildings and turned them into cottages. This had included removing old windows to replace them with double-glazed ones in white wood. He said all buildings were the same age and that he aimed to renovate them in the same fashion. He also said that as the cottages were being done, planning inspectors visited the site on many occasions and never raised an issue.

As the main house was a listed building, the Planning Department had asked for the windows, the floorboards and a central staircase to be repaired and not removed. Mr Barette says they were in such a bad state they had to be removed. A Planning and Building Design Officer said that the windows fell out and crumbled when they were taken out to check their condition. 

Pictured: Mr Barette's planning application for the main house was originally approved in 2012.

Mr Barette claims he did not know the main house was listed and explained: "When we had the planning application for the main house, I thought we had permission to do the same thing as we did with the outbuildings... I didn’t demolish the house like many millionaires do. It was inhabitable. We had rats underneath the floorboards."

Following the removal of the windows, Mr Barette said he was stuck in a stalemate with the department and that he didn't feel he could talk to them due to  what he called was their "arrogance." He said that the Principal Historic Buildings Officer, was adamant the windows had to be repaired.

Mr Barette was served an enforcement notice asking him to put things back to how they were, which he failed to act upon. He was then taken to Royal Court where he was ultimately fined £50,000. 

Throughout the case, Mr Barette made several complaints about the way planning officers dealt with him. He alleged that they once told him "You will do as we say," and were sometimes elusive. He also said that he was taken to Court as a result of a vendetta. Following his court case, he put up signs around his house calling the Planning Department and the Historic Buildings Officer "arrogant, unhelpful and uncompromising."

Pictured: To protest his fine, Mr Barette put signs calling out the Planning Department around his house.

"The money I have been fined, I would have spent in the house," Mr Barette told the Complaints Board. "I also have £17,000 in lawyers fees and there is the scaffolding that was put up but that we then had to take down to avoid paying rent on it. This is five years of my life that I haven’t had lived in the house... My parents lived through the German occupation, that was five years, five years of hell. Well, I have just spent five years of hell because of Planning Department.

"I would like my fine returned so I can carry on. I can't do the house as I wanted to because I don’t have the money... It seems that preferrable treatment has been given to English residents. They just write a cheque, I can't do that."

Chris Jones, Senior Planning Officer, told the Complaints Board that Broughton Lodge Farm was listed as site of special interest in December 2009 and that Mr Barrette was informed shortly after by letters. They explained that any operation that would affect the aspect of the building would be unlawful.

Mr Jones explained that as Mr Barette didn’t appeal the enforcement notice, the Planning Department had no option but to take matters further for prosecution. While he admitted that Mr Barette’s complaints about the planning officers were serious, he said that there hadn’t been any others of the same level.

Mr Jones said that since the planning application for the removal of the windows was approved earlier this year, he hopes it will act as a catalyst for more work with Mr Barette. He also asked that Mr Barette removed the unsightly signs he put up on the façade of the building to protest his fine. 

Pictured: Broughton Lodge Farm on La Verte Rue pictured in 2010.

The Historic Buildings Officer said that the level of work that was carried out inside the house was in clear breach of planning law and definitely against what the Planning Department ordered. She explained that while she sometimes try to work with the clients to meet the historic buildings requirements, she couldn’t do so on this occasion because the whole interior was gone.

Summing up Mr Barette’s complaints, Mr Catchpole said: “One of the real complaints is that, because of the way the two gentlemen dealt with you, they became judge and jury and they then became involved in your prosecution.”

The Panel will write a report back to the Planning Committee later this year.