A COUNCIL has removed an illegally built summerhouse after a three-year battle with the 60-year-old homeowner who refused to remove it.

Rother District Council uprooted the building following a successful prosecution against Steven Earl for failing to comply with a planning enforcement notice.

A spokesman from the council said Earl had “repeatedly” refused to get rid of the house, which had been constructed on the front garden and driveway of his property in Reedswood Road, Broad Oak, near Rye, in September 2019.

In October 2019 the council’s planning enforcement team established the summerhouse had been built "forward of the principal elevation of the property" and therefore required planning permission.

After failing to respond to letters from the council and a subsequent planning enforcement notice, Earl was prosecuted by the council and pleaded guilty in court on December 14, 2021 to failing to comply with an enforcement notice.

Earl was sentenced to a fine of £1,000 and ordered to pay prosecution costs of £1,213.68 and a £100 victim surcharge.

Following the court case, the planning enforcement team wrote to Earl again giving him a deadline of March 15, 2022 to remove the summerhouse.

When Earl refused, the authority took enforcement action and on August 11 council planning enforcement officers, working alongside a specialist remedial action company, removed the structure, including its foundations, and returned the land to its former condition.

Councillor Jonathan Vine-Hall, Rother District Council’s cabinet member for strategic planning, said: “This case goes to show that ignoring the local planning authority, and in particular served enforcement notices, can have severe outcomes.

“Earl has been given ample opportunity to respond to our planning officers over the last three years but has repeatedly failed to do so, which is why we have removed the summerhouse.

“Taking this course of action is not something we do lightly but we won’t hesitate when all other avenues have failed in order to avoid unauthorised developments which have a detrimental effect on residents.”