£1m payout for home sunk by coal mine

WITH its cinema, games room and 26 acres of land, company director Ian White was rightfully proud of the £1.5 million house he had built in rural Warwickshire.

But shortly after its construction, Mr White’s dream home began to collapse, when shock waves from excavations at the last working coal mine in the county caused extensive damage to its walls and foundations.

A judge has now awarded him almost £1 million in damages to rebuild the property, at Tidbury Castle Farm, near Coventry, saying the businessman had no option but to start from scratch.

Mr White bought Tidbury Castle Farm from his grandparents in 2002, later replacing the old farmhouse with the new building.

However, just two years after the house was completed in 2008, cracks appeared in the walls and floors, and window and door frames began to tilt. Walls were “no longer vertical”, the electric security gates stopped working and the floors became so sloped that doors would “swing open or closed of their own accord”.

The problems began in 2010 when a mine shaft was dug half a mile below ground, extending from nearby Daw Mill Colliery to beneath Mr White’s home. Digging the shaft involved the “controlled collapse” of void spaces, “creating a subsidence wave at the surface”.

Daw Mill Colliery shut in 2013, after an underground fire led to its licence being revoked, leaving Mr White to sue the Coal Authority – the government agency – for £950,000 damages.

Judge Elizabeth Cooke agreed that the only feasible option was for him to demolish and rebuild the main house. She told the Upper Tribunal that he was entitled to have his home returned to the same state it was in before the subsidence damage occurred and the only realistic way of achieving that was to start again. She awarded Mr White £670,000 as an interim payout while the final figure was assessed.