Make changes or extension to cottage will be torn down

Six-month ultimatum over building without planning permission

Council chiefs have refused to give permission for an extension that has already been built and told the owner it will be torn down in six months if amendments are not made.

Plans for the single-storey brick building on the back of a cottage in Lenham – which comes under Charing parish – were referred to Ashford Borough Council’s planning committee “due to their sensitivity.”

The site has been at the centre of a bitter neighbour battle for a number of years.

The owner built an extension on the back of her house where a conservatory used to be and applied for retrospective planning permission in June last year.

But next door neighbour Kym Hatala criticised the extension saying it overlooked her garden, doesn’t have suitable guttering and has been badly built.

The council ordered the owner to make a number of amendments in six months, including parapet guttering, but she failed to do so.

The extension came before the council’s planning committee again on Wednesday, August 17, but officers rejected her new application for it, saying it hadn’t complied with any of their previous requirements.

They said it was considered to be unacceptable due to its visual appearance, the standard of the build and its impact on the neighbouring property.

A council spokesman said: “The council has been actively discussing an acceptable solution with the owner of 1 Primrose Cottages to provide suitable guttering and external appearance to the side of the development facing the neighbour.”

Officers said the owner now has six months to change the extension to meet their standards.

Neighbour Mrs Hatala said: “She thought she could get away with it. But if she doesn’t do what the council said they will pull it down because the whole building hasn’t got planning permission.

“We have still got that awful building sitting there but we just hope she listens to them but I have a feeling she will just leave it there and hope it will go away.”

‘We have still got that awful building sitting there’

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The extension at the centre of the controversy at the back of the house in Primrose Cottages, Lenham