A children’s nursery, in a tiny hamlet of eight homes, that breached its planning conditions by having 40 per cent more children than allowed has been granted permission to formally expand. Little Puddleducks in Siston Court, near Siston in South Gloucestershire, had its retrospective application approved by councillors despite objections from nearly all of the local residents and the authority’s conservation officer.
The site, a Grade II*-listed building next to an avenue of trees in the grounds of Grade I-listed Siston Court, was given consent by planning officers to become a nursery for 33 youngsters in 2017 but has taken 46 for several years, the development management committee was told.
South Gloucestershire Council launched enforcement action against the planning breach, so the nursery applied for permission to allow it to continue to have 46 children and increase the number of parking spaces, despite damage to tree roots that have become entangled in a mesh designed to stop the ground being churned up.
Local resident Dominic Trotman-Dickenson told the committee on Thursday, February 20, that the application would cause the “destruction of the historic environment”. He said: “The parents all arrive between 8.30am and 9am through a single access gate. It is chaos.”
Little Puddleducks managing director Sacha Hallard said: “Our drop-off service is efficient – parents spend on average three minutes dropping off and collecting their children. Children arrive at staggered times from 8am to 9.30am, and evening pick-up is from 4pm to 6pm.
“There are 5,000 new homes proposed within a three-mile radius of our setting. The additional spaces are required for our setting to be sustainable.
“If permission is not granted, this setting will not be viable to continue to provide an early-years service to the community. This will leave 102 local families without childcare and 22 members of staff without financial security and stable employment.
“The disruption this would cause and the loss of childcare spaces would have a catastrophic impact on our wider community.” Cllr June Bamford (Conservative, Hanham) said: “I’m horrified that a previous committee even passed this.
“The local authority has a duty to protect our heritage assets. The officer’s report says such assets are an irreplaceable resource and should be conserved,” she added.
“When you get planning permission, you have to adhere to that permission, especially in a sensitive area. The harm outweighs the benefits. They’ve gone up to 46 children in breach of planning conditions – what is to stop them from going up to 60? I’m totally disgusted.”
Cllr Paul Hughes (Conservative, Bitton & Oldland Common) said: “I can’t see any mitigation to stop the mess that this car park has already exerted itself on the locale. Whatever you put there is going to be an absolute mess.
“It’s like a farmer has been up and down there with a tractor. It’s absolutely awful. If this was coming here the first time round, we would turn it down.”
A report to the committee said the main issue for councillors to consider was whether the extra 13 children would cause “harm to the significance of the assets affected”, regardless of the planning breach. It said the council’s early years and childcare team supported the application because the Boyd Valley ward had a shortage of 53 childcare places for youngsters under two years old and the authority had a legal duty to ensure that there were enough free nursery places.
The report said the public benefits outweighed the harm. Cllr John Bradbury (Labour, Bradley Stoke South) said: “There is obviously a very heartfelt feeling from members of the public about the heritage asset but I’m rather persuaded by the fact there is a shortage of 53 spaces for the provision of childcare. Early years education is crucial.”
Cllr Tony Williams (Lib Dem, Severn Vale) said: “We would all agree that if this was a new application for a change of use of a Grade II*-listed building to a nursery, we would be recommending refusal. However, it has planning permission and we can’t do anything about it. I hate retrospective planning applications but we are where we are.”
Cllr Jayne Stansfield (Lib Dem, Thornbury) said: “The harm to the setting was done by the 2017 agreement and no further harm will be done by this, but it gives us an opportunity to address the compaction of the roots by having an extra condition.”
Principal planning officer Suzanne D’Arcy said enforcement action had been suspended pending the committee’s decision and that a new planning condition would prevent further damage to the trees.
Councillors voted 7-2 along with officers’ recommendations to grant consent.