Chorley traveller saga ends after 15 years

A Chorley traveller community who moved onto greenbelt land in the borough 15 years ago and have been fighting for the right to stay there ever since have been granted their wish by councillors.

The Linfoot family say it is “better than winning the lottery” to have been told they can finally call the site – on Hut Lane Lane in Heath Charnock – their forever home.

Chorley Council’s planning committee has granted permanent permission for use of the plot as a residential gypsy and traveller facility after acknowledging the authority had failed to provide suitable accommodation elsewhere.

The decision brings to an end an at times bitter wrangle between the family, the council and some of the Linfoot’s neighbours over the future of the secluded site, close to the M61.

After caravans first arrived at the location in June 2009, the borough authority attempted to use its planning powers over several years to end the unauthorised occupation of the land.

However, in 2013, the council approved the first of a series of temporary permissions – with others following in 2015, 2018 and 2021 – each of which allowed the travellers to stay put for around three years.

At the same time, the authority was exploring the possibility of creating a permanent gypsy and traveller site as part of a wider housing and commercial development at Cowling Farm.  But that scheme never materialised – amid rising costs and logistical complications – and a report presented to the planning committee this week revealed there was no “credible prospect” of it doing so.

Principal planning officer Iain Crossland said the “settled” status of the traveller community on the site and the lack of any alternative accommodation for them amounted to the “very special circumstances” needed to justify the harm to the greenbelt caused by the development.

Patty Linfoot told the committee that her family had spent 15 years trying to secure “a safe place to live” for members including her elderly parents and her now adult children – as well as for future generations.

“Contrary to belief, we are council taxpayers and have been since day one.   This is the opportunity for Chorley to recognise – finally – that gypsies are part of the community. We just want a normal life for our family and somewhere decent to live,” Mrs. Linfoot said.

She was supported by local resident Jason Smalley who said the Linfoots had become “good neighbours…embracing as friends all who would accept them”.

“The site is hidden between a motorway and a motorway bridge and is surrounded by a woodland shelter which negates any issues of harm to the openness of [the greenbelt]”, he added.

‘What’s changed?’

However, council leader Alistair Bradley – who is also the councillor for the Chorley South East and Heath Charnock ward in which Hut Lane sits – said he had been asked to speak on behalf of a group of residents, some of whom were in attendance, who were “overwhelmingly opposed” to permanent permission being granted.

They said that the weight given by planning officers to the site being for the wider Linfoot family was “badly undermined” by the absence of any conditions over the potential use of the plot by others in future.

“This means that the site could…be sold or leased to non-related occupiers and the basis for the special circumstances relied on to overcome the greenbelt restrictions would be lost,” Cllr Bardley quoted the residents as saying.

They said any decision to approve the permanent proposal would be “an unprecedented betrayal of the overwhelming majority of local residents by the council”.

Cllr Bradley himself said “nothing has changed” about the situation since the authority first rejected a bid by the family to remain.

“It is still greenbelt land – there is still no good reason for permission to be granted.  Where in the borough is safe if this gets passed?” he asked.   The meeting was told the decision ultimately taken would not set a precedent, as all planning applications are judged on their own merits.

Patty Linfoot also stressed that Cllr Bradley was not speaking on behalf of all locals, many of whom, she said, supported the family.

The council received 88 expressions of support for the plans, with 45 people lodging objections.

In contrast to the reticence of the committee to consider anything beyond temporary permissions on all previous occasions, members had now seemingly concluded, in the words of Cllr Jean Sherwood, that the saga had “gone on for long enough”.

That sentiment was echoed several times in a brief debate on the proposal, during which Cllr Katie Wilkie said that when she had visited the site she found it “very well..maintained and in-keeping within the area”.

“It was very private and respectful to the community,” she added.

Cllr Alistair Morwood, who is also the authority’s cabinet member for planning, said she had been unable to find the spot, because it was so well-screened.

He also sympathised with the family’s plight – and recognised the council’s own shortcomings.

“I can’t even imagine the pressure that you’re under trying to keep your family and your business…going with this hanging over your head.

“At the end of the day, we promised the families we [would] give you another site.  We failed, sadly – and it wasn’t through lack of effort – [but] there comes a point where you have to say, ‘Let’s have some common sense.’”

The committee unanimously approved the application, which will allow up to seven caravans on the land, with a maximum of three being mobile homes.  A condition will prevent the area being used for commercial purposes.

The need for gypsy and traveller sites within Chorley was identified in an assessment undertaken in 2019. It found a requirement for 10 permanent pitches in the borough, including those necessary to meet the needs of the Linfoot family.

‘We often wondered what we would do if we were evicted’

Speaking to the Local Democracy Reporting Service after the meeting, Patty Linfoot said she could scarcely believe that the “daily” uncertainty of the past 15 years was over.

“It’s a case of never knowing where you’re going to be in two or three years’ time – where are you going to live?   And if you don’t get [another temporary] permission and then [the council] start enforcement action when it’s winter time, you think to yourself, ‘What are we going to do?’

“I couldn’t feel any better now than if we’d won the lottery,” she added.

Twelve individuals currently live on the site – three of them being the Linfoot’s sons – who were just three, five and eight years old when the family first arrived in 2009.

“They won’t have that struggle we’ve had to have,” Mrs. Linfoot said.

“And to the people who [criticise] gypsies for just going onto land and then applying for planning permission, my response to that is that if a gypsy or traveller applied for permission before moving on to a piece of land, they would never get it.  A stop notice would be put on straight away.

“The only way to do it is to pull on and then fight [to stay].”

The Linfoots say they believe the opinions that a lot of locals have about them have changed since they first pitched up, with the objection-to-support ratio being “turned on its head” compared to earlier planning applications.

There was no grand celebration after they returned to what they can now regard as their permanent home after the committee meeting at which they were granted that long-term foundation – but there was some emotion.

“My mother and father are 83 and 80 [respectively] and have been in this area 60 years – they’d stay in Chorley lay-by when they were doing the carnivals.

“My Dad was in tears – he was worried he wasn’t going to [see this day] happen,” Mrs. Linfoot said.