A property developer’s attempt to have a village hall reclassified has failed after a planning inspector rejected the appeal.
JBC Property Developments had been fighting to get the Meadows Hut in Stoneleigh recognised as having “nil use” rather than its current designation of “community use”.
The company took the matter to appeal after Warwick District Council turned down their application back in 2024.
It’s the latest chapter in what’s become a decade-long battle over the building’s future.
Last month, the inspector sided with the council, ruling that JBC hadn’t sufficiently proven the site had been abandoned.
The inspector concluded that, on the balance of probabilities, a lawful development certificate couldn’t be granted for the building to be classified as having “nil use”.
The Meadows Hut has sat empty since 2013 and JBC says three different owners have all struggled to find a new purpose for the timber structure.
The developer has described the building as a “dreadful eyesore” and argues it’s simply not fit for public use anymore.
A property developer’s attempt to have a village hall reclassified has failed after a planning inspector rejected the appeal
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PLANNING PERMISSION
JBC maintains there are obvious structural problems and that the building has essentially reached the end of its useful life.
But council planners see things differently.
Warwick District Council’s position is that the hut could still be brought back into community use, despite the developer’s concerns about its condition.
The council refused to accept that the “community use” designation should be dropped, prompting JBC to take the matter to appeal.
Despite the hut being unoccupied for 13 years, the inspector ruled that the ‘community use’ designation remained correct
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PLANNING PERMISSION
In their appeal, JBC put forward a straightforward argument.
The developer questioned: “If a reasonable person saw the state of the building, knew that it had remained like this for the last 14 years and had no intervening uses, no repairs, no public use or maintenance, no visits at all would they, being a reasonable person consider the use to be abandoned?”
JBC firmly believed the answer would be yes, and that the certificate should be issued, recognising the community use as abandoned.
The interior of the building has also been left unattended
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PLANNING PERMISSION
But the inspector still wasn’t convinced.
The council’s argument was that JBC simply hadn’t done enough to demonstrate the community use had been properly abandoned.
That reasoning formed the basis for refusing the certificate in the first place, and the inspector agreed.