Community Rejoices as Claim for Adverse Possession Successfully Upheld

Challenging Councils & Public Bodies
Leading Housing Solicitors

HJA In The News April 14, 2026

Gregory Horne, Solicitor in the Housing Law team at Hodge Jones & Allen, successfully assisted the defendant in the case of Elitestone v Revill, helping Mr. Revill to demonstrate factual possession of the land in dispute; whereby the original claim for possession was dismissed with the counterclaim for adverse possession allowed with declarations and costs.

Hodge Jones & Allen took on Mr Revill’s case after his previous legal representative was unable to secure him a legal aid certificate. Gregory then had to work with counsel, Timothy Baldwin, Barrister at Garden Court Chambers, to formulate a defence in less than 14 days’ time as a result of the switch in legal teams.

On taking instructions, Mr Revill explained that he was in occupation of a plot of land referred to as Unit 16 Holts Field in opposition to Elitestone Ltd, a real estate company who intended to develop the land.

Wales online: Inside Holtsfield, the thriving but hidden community that has emerged on a holiday site which became a wartime refuge

Holts Field is a small patch of land housing some twenty families who have lived there since the 1930s and some of whom had held a licence to occupy prior to Elitestone’s acquisition. Mr Revill explained that he had been in occupation of the land for 35 years, since 1991, and that he had been active in campaigns to defend the people who lived there, including himself, from eviction for the entire period of his occupation.

He directed Hodge Jones & Allen to a national campaign by the people of Holts Field which had resulted in a case which escalated to the House of Lords in 1997 from which a number of the occupiers of the field had won secure Rent Act tenancies. Mr Revill explained that his occupation began when he paid the person previously in occupation £6,000 for the right to the chalet. It later transpired that this was the wrong person to pay as they had never had permission form the licence holder to live in the chalet themselves.

Swansea council: Conservation area – Holt’s Field

Mr Revill was unfortunately the victim of a fire in March 2024 which destroyed his chalet on Holts Field, destroyed all the documentation which might have lent credibility to his claims, and caused Mr Revill such severe injury that he was medically declared dead and had no heartbeat for 15 minutes. He was eventually resuscitated and it was at that point that possession proceedings began.

Gregory assisted in preparing a defence which argued firstly that he was a licensee, having bought a licence when he took up occupation, and in the alternative that he was in adverse possession and had been since 1991 meaning that he was entitled to a declaration that the property was held on trust for him beneficially.

At a three day trial last week, Gregory and Timothy Baldwin were both able to successfully persuade the judge that despite the deficiencies in documentary evidence, there was sufficient credible evidence, primarily in the form of the live testimony evidence of those who were also involved in the struggle for the field in 1991, that Mr Revill had begun his occupation in the summer of 1991 and was therefore entitled to the declaration sought.

The Land Is Ours 1997 Action: 1997: action in the Gower, Holtsfield homepage

At that trial, HHJ Beard gave an oral judgement making findings of fact on the evidence that the Defendant had been in uninterrupted possession of Unit 16 from August 1991 and that breaks in possession in 2019 and as a result of the fire did not amount to abandonment and he had sought secure and improve the land. Therefore, the elements of demonstrating adverse possession were made out as he has factual possession of the land, had the necessary intention to possession the land and this was without the Claimants consent. Further as the possession had been at least 12 years prior to the 13 October 2003 before the Land Registration Act 2003 came into force he was entitled to the declaration and registration as proprietor. Thus, the claim for possession was dismissed and the counterclaim for adverse possession allowed with declarations and costs.

The case demonstrated the strength of the community and showed solidarity in action amongst those who have lived and fought for their right to remain for all those years.

As a result of this ruling, Mr Revill has already begun construction work on a new chalet on the site and intends to take up occupation and rejoin the community there at the earliest opportunity. Gregory and Mr Baldwin also achieved an order for costs subject to detailed assessment as per legal aid guidance.

Commenting on the successful result, Gregory stated: “I was very pleased to be able to help Mr Revill. It is inspiring to see a community come together to make right such a long running dispute and I am hopeful that this judgement will bring to a close the 35 plus years of conflict between Elitestone and the residents of Holts Field.”

Read more elsewhere here on The Land Is Ours website: Holtsfield – The Story so Far

Pippa Middleton ready for a rumble with The Ramblers’ Association after shutting footpath at her £15million mansion

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-15706723/Pippa-Middleton-Ramblers-Association-shutting-footpath-15million-mansion.html

When Pippa Middleton and James Matthews paid £15 million for a 32-room red-brick Georgian mansion set in 145 acres of Berkshire countryside, they surely thought they had found the perfect sanctuary to raise their young family in privacy.

But the Princess of Wales’s younger sister and her hedge-fund tycoon husband now find themselves in a battle with furious locals, after they barred dog walkers and ramblers from going through their grounds.

The couple will now have to persuade a government-appointed planning inspector next month that they are within their rights to withdraw long-standing access to the track.

Grade I-listed Barton Court, which sits on the River Kennet near the village of Kintbury, was previously owned by the late retail tycoon Sir Terence Conran, who allowed locals to use Mill Lane, which winds through the estate.

But when the couple arrived in 2022 with their three children – Arthur, seven, Grace, five, and Rose, three – they wasted little time in closing off the lane with an electric gate.

Signs warning ‘Private: No Public Access’ and ‘No Trespassing’ appeared around the perimeter.

Thirty-five residents, backed by The Ramblers Association, applied to West Berkshire Council to have Mill Lane declared a public right of way.

The council sided with the villagers, but Mr Matthews, through his land agent, then objected.

Do YOU think that access to this footpath should be made public?

No, it’s on private property
Yes, people have used this lane for a long time

Next month a planning inspector will hear representations from both sides before making a legally binding ruling.

Eugene Futcher, chairman of West Berkshire Ramblers, told The Mail on Sunday: ‘The public have had  for a very long time – certainly before the 1960s.’

‘Taking it away will be inconvenient, especially when walking is so important. It will force people on to the main road, which is very dangerous.

‘There is no footpath or verge.

‘The paths were never closed under Conran – he actively encouraged people to use them.’

Rob Brown, 68, a Kintbury resident since 1985, said: 1 don’t think they give a damn about what anyone in the village thinks.

‘They’re not very popular in the area. They think they’re better than everyone else. They re not even the proper Royal Family

‘Closing the path is a nuisance. Conran was better for the area.’

Peter Clegg, 68, said: I don’t know who they think they are. They think they can decide who can walk where and when.

‘It’s not on. It’s not like people are trampling on arable fields. People have been walking there for a long time. It shows a lack of respect.’

A resident of 20 years added: ‘I understand their need for privacy, but you can’t move into a village and demand that people change their ways.’

The footpath dispute is not the only source of friction since the couple arrived in Kintbury.

Plans to renovate the mansion stalled after archaeologists warned that work could disturb prehistoric remains on the site.

And last year a party to mark Mr Matthews’ 50th birthday drew complaints over late-night music.

Guardian: finding out who owns land will become simpler under plans to make the best use of green spaces and hit net zero targets

Fiona Harvey Environment editor Wed 18 Mar 2026

Finding out who owns land in England is to become much simpler because a paywall will be lifted from large parts of the Land Registry, the government is to announce.

A small number of landowners control the majority of land but finding out who owns what is difficult to piece together, even for government departments, owing to the way the Land Registry operates. Freeing up access will make it easier to determine ownership of key areas, such as river catchments, grouse moors and peatland.

The change comes as part of a major reform to the way England’s land is managed. The government’s long-awaited land use framework – to be unveiled by Emma Reynolds, the environment secretary, on Wednesday afternoon – marks the first time that government has attempted to assess how best to use farmland, nature reserves and areas of degraded land to help balance competing needs for land for food production, housing, energy and industry.

For the first time, ministers will set out how much land is needed to meet the UK’s net zero target through growing forests and restoring peatland as “carbon sinks” and through energy generation from solar and wind-farms. Only about 1% of land will be needed for renewable energy generation, according to the government’s new estimate, and much of the land required will still be used for food production, for instance through livestock grazing around wind-farms and under solar panels.

New mapping will also make it easier to assess how the restoration of peatlands in upland areas could reduce flooding from rivers, which is expected to worsen as the climate crisis deepens.

Reynolds said: “It is more important than ever that we make the right decisions about our finite land, especially in the face of the dual threat of the climate and nature crises. The land use framework will hardwire climate resilience and nature-based solutions into our decision-making to ensure that we have safe homes for the future.”

Guy Shrubsole, author of Who Owns England?, said: “The bold promise to open up the Land Registry would finally bring to an end a thousand years of secrecy shrouding who owns England, and enable greater scrutiny of what goes on behind the barbed-wire fences that criss-cross the countryside. Given that 1% of the population own half of England, it’s only reasonable that the largest landowners should be held most responsible for restoring nature to these ‘dewilded’ isles. The new land use framework is an ambitious step towards making England a greener, fairer and more pleasant land.”

However, the government will stop well short of directing how land must be used in any area. There will be no attempts to force landowners to give up control and no national scheme to mandate the conversion of land to carbon sinks. The framework will be used to “steer” house-builders away from constructing homes on flood-plains, after concerns about the number of new-build homes at risk from flooding as the climate crisis worsens.

The aim that everyone should be within 15 minutes of a green space or water will also become easier to meet within the new framework, as councils will be given tools to identify where green space is lacking so that they can invest accordingly. About one in five people in England lack such access at present, but this is worst among the most deprived communities.

Farmers have been concerned that food production would be downgraded in favour of turning land to nature protection or use as carbon sinks, for instance through growing forests. But campaigners said there need not be a contradiction between nature protection and farming.

“Wildlife in the UK is in crisis so nature must be given space to recover,” said Brendan Costelloe, policy director at the Soil Association. “But for the land that will remain farmland, it’s vital the government recognises that food production does not have to stop to create space for nature. We can and must make sure the land that’s producing food is doing so in a nature-friendly way.”

The Soil Association wants more support for farmers to grow peas and beans, which fix nitrogen in the soil naturally, and more trees to be planted for forage, human food and wood, as well as a shift away from growing crops that require a high degree of soil disturbance on slopes and flood-plains.

After the scandal of Andrew, the royals owe us transparency about their finances

https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/king-charles-andrew-mountbatten-windsor-royal-family-crisis-duty-empathy-b2924890.html

https://archive.is/hfQ7w

They have the use of 50 residences on estates totalling 250,000 acres and a life of wealth and privilege paid for by the public purse, yet much of their financial lives are shrouded in secrecy. The time has come to open up the books, writes Chris Blackhurst

Saturday 21 February 2026 06:00 GMT

Life will never be the same again for Britain�s royal family. The Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor scandal has rocked the institution to the core. Rather like the banking crisis of 2008, when the authorities were desperate to avoid contagion dragging down other banks, they are keen to prevent the spread.

For a body that likes to remain discreet and private, this is a transforming, unnerving prospect. Andrew�s troubles have shone an unwelcome light on not only his, but all of their living and financial arrangements. It�s not that the other royals have anything particular to hide � we don�t know � but rather that so much has hitherto been off limits. To release all the detail, to suddenly go from nothing to everything, as they might well be required to, is bound to provoke shock and anger.

This is a family, or �firm�, that likes to control how it�s presented. While this was once justified on the grounds that to let the light in somehow destroys the mystique, those days have well and truly passed. It is hard to see how those guard rails can be preserved when the deference has diminished, and MPs and media are champing at the bit. Even David Dimbleby (David Dimbleby!) has dared to front a documentary that asks, pointedly: What�s the Monarchy for?

The National Audit Office is currently investigating Andrew�s use of his former home at Royal Lodge, and its report will be sent to the Commons public accounts committee. Its findings will be published and there will be public hearings.

That is just for starters. The probe is not likely to stop there. This is an issue that is not going to vanish. A public struggling with an ever-rising cost-of-living burden, tax increases and a chronic housing shortage will demand answers, not just about Andrew, but about the wider family. They will not be receptive to obfuscation. The genie has been released from the bottle. There can be no going back.

A detailed report last year from the anti-monarchy group Republic put the bill for the royal family�s upkeep at more than �500m annually. A substantial portion is derived from the sovereign grant. It comprises profits from the crown estate�s �15bn property portfolio, which covers a large area of London�s St James�s and locations dotted around Britain. Now, people want to know how those revenues are arrived at. Are rents properly and fairly calculated? Do some tenants enjoy more favourable terms than others?

These are questions, and there are many, many others, that will require answers. Transparency is the order of the day. Tellingly, given Republic’s ideological antecedents, their study was not challenged by the royal household or its supporters. It prompted Norman Baker, the former Lib Dem MP, to ask in a new book, Royal Mint, National Debt ‘ The Shocking Truth About the Royal Family’s Finances, to highlight that the bill for maintaining the UK royal family ‘is undoubtedly much higher than that of any other European monarchy’.

He contrasts them with other royal families. In the Netherlands, the heir to the Dutch throne, Princess Catharina-Amalia, announced when she was 18 that she would renounce her �300,000 annual income while she was a student and forfeit �1.6m in expenses; in Sweden, the king removed royal titles from five of his grandchildren; in Denmark, the queen took them away from four of her grandchildren, saying it was ‘for their own good’, while in Copenhagen, Crown Prince Frederik and his wife, Princess Mary, ferry their young children to state school by cargo bike. Writes Baker: ‘You can never imagine this normality, that informality, with the British royal family.’

Here, our equivalents have the use of 50 residences, estates totalling 250,000 acres – among them the well known like Buckingham Palace, Kensington Palace, Windsor Castle, Clarence House, St James’s Palace, Balmoral, Sandringham, Holyrood, Gatcombe Park, Highgrove, Royal Lodge, Bagshot Park and Thatched House Lodge, but also other Palladian houses and farms.

Included in the royal collection, too, are the ‘grace-and-favour’ apartments for servants and former staff and anyone else the King wants to put up. At the last public estimate, there were 272 of those alone. But that figure is cautionary. Because we simply do not know.

Taking the royal family forward is Prince William. PR-savvy and closely in tune with the zeitgeist, William and his wife, Catherine, are not afraid to use the media when it suits them to publicly voice their concerns and share personal information. But, thanks to Andrew, they, too, are in a bind. While William has indicated his desire for a slimmed-down monarchy, presumably akin to those Scandi models, he runs the risk of splitting his own family, of casting some relations into the wilderness, reducing them to commoners.

Ejection brings with it the threat of a royal turning rogue. William and Catherine have endured that with Harry and Meghan; this could spark a repeat � or repeats � and heap even more damage on the institution.

Prior to the latest escalation of the Andrew scandal, William kept his tax affairs secret, unlike the King. When the King was heir to the throne, his office outlined the figure that Charles had voluntarily paid in tax. But for the last two years, William has refused to reveal his own figure. The Duchies of Cornwall and Lancaster, which are now his personal property, will not say what William pays in tax on the surplus profits he receives from the sprawling estates spread across many English counties.

While the latest Duchy of Cornwall accounts showed the estate made a profit of £22.9m in its last financial year, William cannot be made to disclose how much tax he pays – unlike other bodies, the royal household is not subject to the same Freedom of Information Act regulations. All his private secretary has said is that ‘the Prince of Wales pays the highest rate of income tax’. But we do not know.

Similarly, the crown estate is keen to stress that William and Kate are paying ‘market rent’ on Forest Lodge, their new ‘forever’ home. Independent valuers from Hamptons and Savills estate agents were appointed to value the property, and the couple received independent legal and property advice, as did the crown estate.

These bland explanations may satisfy some, but there will be vocal critics for whom they will not suffice. Andrew’s troubles have ensured there are more of them than ever before, and this time, their concerns cannot simply be dismissed.

A period of painful disclosure lies ahead.

Nice to see the new edition of The Land magazine but nowt about a chilling test case in Bristol, which other councils are hoping to run out across the country…

The City Council’s Exclusion Order is aimed at The Downs, land owned by Bristol’s archaic Edward Colston slave trading society, the Merchant Venturers. They are now mostly corporate lawyers and are also using their legal expertise to charge all regular sports activities on The Downs, such as frisbee groups, £2,600 for the use of the this 400 acre open space. It seems a silent cry has gone out from the Merchants, echoed at City Hall, for all Bristol’s public land to be monetised.

But it’s not just the housing crisis which led to over 150 vehicles staying on The Downs last year. The reason was that, since Covid, the council have been pursuing a systematic programme of traveller evictions from all the city’s biggest traveller sites on unused land, forcing hundreds out from self-managed sites onto the streets.

Bristol’s Merchant Venturers documentary HTV West Eye View (1995) Cabot Colston Mafia https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VVAq1YRK0RI

We are the ones to protect the Downs say Merchant Venturers

The Society of Merchant Venturers have defended the status quo, pointing out that most of it is their land, and is only open to the public because of the 1861 Act.

https://www.bristolpost.co.uk/news/bristol-news/ones-protect-downs-say-merchant-9628982

Personal trainers could be charged £2,600 to use the Downs

https://www.bristolpost.co.uk/news/bristol-news/personal-trainers-could-charged-2600-10634391

Social Cleansing by stealth with The Downs as ‘killing zone’

About 300 cara/vans on large off-road sites around the city (Gasworks, Lockleaze; Tramways in Brislington etc.) have been evicted over the last three years, leaving hundreds of travellers kerb-side. Those trying to ride out the housing crisis were thus ejected from traditional secure sites, by a council charged to house all its citizens, onto the streets.

Forced out of secure, self-managed sites, arson attacks and graffiti death-threats have now become almost a weekly occurrence at Bristol City Council’s hands.

These exact same sites are now being ‘reopened’ by Bristol City Council as steel-gated compounds or ‘Meanwhile Sites’. The sites each have one water standpipe and drain-hole and travellers are expected to pay £1,700 a year in rent to the council plus from April £2,000 Band A council tax too to live on a council CCTV surveilled, ID spot checked site, which van dwellers used to happily self-manage, and live on for free.

Much of the news coverage ignores the Green ‘Human Rights City’ Council’s blatant act of ‘social cleansing’ because the 500 or so who are being forced out of the city by the council flytipping enforcement team, have no money, and no legal representation.

The Spectator: A day with Bristol’s van dwellers

https://archive.is/PNV6h

Trial date set as Downs ‘van dwellers’ saga nears an end

https://www.bristolpost.co.uk/news/bristol-news/trial-date-set-downs-van-10797139

About 45 vehicles remained parked on roads surrounding the park in north Bristol (down from 150 early in 2025)

Bristol City Council is set for a court showdown as it moves to permanently ban people living in vehicles from the roads around the Downs.

In November, the council said it would seek to move people on from the Downs after designating the group of vehicles there as a ‘high impact’ site, due to what the council said was evidence of people using the area as a toilet.

Nonetheless, about 45 vehicles remain parked on roads along the outside of the green space in leafy north Bristol. At its peak, the Downs ‘encampment’ consisted of about 150 vehicles.

Now, a trial date has been set where the council will apply to have vehicles permanently barred from the area.

At the trial, on April 16, the council will apply for a possession order for the roads, allowing them to evict people living in vehicles there, and then an injunction to prevent them from returning have the vehicles still occupying roads along the perimeter of the Downs.

The court hearing will allow people on both sides of the debate to have their say; the council has until February 26 to publish a map detailing the proposed new exclusion zone, along with details of how people can take part in the court case.

At a brief hearing outlining next steps in the long-running saga at Bristol Civil Justice Court on Thursday (February 5), the court heard from both critics and supporters of people living in vehicles.

Alan Jenkinson, appearing on behalf of Protect The Downs – a group of locals who have waged a long campaign against the so-called van dwellers – said he wanted the scope of the proposed injunction to be extended to include other roads in the area.

“We support the council’s application,” he said. “I would implore the court to extend the broad nature of the injunction to other roads.

“We know from our experience and we’ve got substantial evidence to prove the danger to the public of allowing inhabitations on the roads.

“(The vehicles pose a) real risk and threat to the community in the area.”

Although the council has repeatedly promised to engage with the people still living in vehicles in the area to better understand their circumstances, there is limited evidence to suggest they have done so.

Gerard Winstanley, from the Bristol Housing Action Movement group, said more needed to be done to make sure people living in vehicles in the area had their say on their future.

“We’ve had virtually no representation whatsoever from the people who are targeted by this exclusion order,” he said.

“There are roughly 45 vehicles in the area. As part of our submission, what I’d just ask is that there’s more deliberate publicity given to the times and dates that these orders are being sought so that people can at least find out what the council intends to do and when.”

Mr Winstanley said BHAM would seek to be included as a party acting against the council in April’s trial.

The council will also apply to extend a separate injunction which currently bars people from parking on the grass itself. That injunction is due to expire on July 25.

Robin Denford, appearing on behalf of the council, said:“The injunction that has been granted already has worked extremely well,” citing the example of one trespasser who had been dealt with without any issues in January.

The Downs encampment represents a small percentage of the total number of vehicles being used as homes around Bristol, about 600 according to the council’s last estimate.

April’s trial is scheduled to last two days.

Residents link hands to protest plan for 20m structures at beauty spot

Radar plans may allow Trump to dominate space from Wales – say campaigners

There are major plans to build 27 radar dishes at Cawdor Barracks in Brawdy but residents are not happy

https://www.walesonline.co.uk/news/wales-news/residents-link-hands-beach-protest-32219420

A large number of locals came together to link hands on a Pembrokeshire beach in a protest against plans for “huge” structures overlooking the coastline. There are plans to build 27 radar dishes at Cawdor Barracks in Brawdy to monitor satellites and other objects in space, something which many residents object to.

Residents attended the protest on Newgale Beach on Sunday, August 3, with the linked chain of people stretching from one side of the beach to the other.

Newgale sits underneath a hill which the dishes, which would be as tall as four London buses, part of the Deep Space Advanced Radar Capability (DARC) project to track satellites, could be erected on. They will be 68ft (21m) high and 49ft (15m) wide and will be situated close to the Pembrokeshire Coast National Park.

https://www.facebook.com/reel/3933753110248943/

Locals established the PARC Against DARC pressure group last year when the plans were announced, creating a petition and lobbying politicians. The petition has gathered over 17,000 signatures and opposes the plans on health and environmental grounds. It says that DARC would “drive a wrecking ball through our tourism industry.” Defence Secretary John Healey last year said the proposed redevelopment of Cawdor Barracks “secures jobs at home and defence capabilities for the future.”

Following the recent protest, a PARC Against DARC spokesperson said: “It’s overwhelmingly clear to us how much opposition there is both to DARC radar and to the proposed Newgale bypass road, which has just seen a flood of objections in its public consultation that went well over 90% against.

“It’s almost universally believed here that the road, which would decimate the Brandy Brook valley and cost tens of millions, would be required for both the construction and operation of DARC.” A public consultation for a Newgale bypass road is ongoing but the Ministry of Defence has not requested such a road as part of its plans.

Tim Rees, director of local annual Pembrokeshire music event Unearthed Festival, raised concerns about the impact the proposed dishes would have on local businesses.

Speaking at the demonstration, he said: “We have a beautiful coastline which the National Park has done a great job of preserving, and we’re about to turn a blind eye to decades’ worth of preservation, for what? For something we don’t have a say in, that won’t benefit tourism, and will directly impact me in my business.

“I run a music festival as well as some hospitality businesses, and this isn’t going to help. The money that’s invested, we won’t see that as local people.” The Ministry of Defence has already begun an environmental impact assessment for the proposed redevelopment which will include examining its impact on the skyline, wildlife, local people and communities, businesses, as well as the wider landscape and heritage.

For our free daily briefing on the biggest issues facing the nation, sign up to the Wales Matters newsletter here

In 2023 the UK, US and Australian security pact signed in 2023, when the three states agreed to build a system which could identify potential “targets” up to 22,000 miles away from Earth where many military satellites are positioned. DARC is not directly part of the partnership but involves collaboration between Australia, the UK and US.

PARC Against DARC say many local residents are concerned about the health impacts they claim are associated with the radiation DARC radar would produce.

“There’s staggering scientific evidence that shows elevated cancer rates in people who work in radar stations that are exactly the same, using the same wavelengths as the one that would be at DARC,” said Emma Tannahill.

“Those people who got cancer were not sitting on the radar dishes at their lunch breaks: they were people who were working at the stations, and they were not directly in front those beams.”

A Ministry of Defence Spokesperson said: “The Deep Space Advanced Radar Capability (DARC) programme will secure long-term jobs in Pembrokeshire, Wales and help protect essential satellite communication and navigation networks.

“We are engaging with the local community on proposals to redevelop Cawdor Barracks to host DARC, which will be operated by UK personnel.

“We are following processes agreed with Pembrokeshire Country Council and have already begun a comprehensive Environmental Impact Assessment, including to ensure the project has minimal impact on the local skyline.

“We continue to hold public information events in Pembrokeshire to hear views and answer any questions. We respect people’s right to peaceful protest.”

What  can we learn from the 1920s and 1930s Plotlands, that might help solve the 2020s housing crisis?

Plotlands books  by Stefan Szczelkun

Plotlands of Shepperton by Stefan Szczelkun

Chalet Fields of the Gower by Stefan Szczelkun and Owen Short 

Why Plotlands were suppressed as a form of housing by Stefan Szczelkun

Video: UK Forgotten Self-Building Tradition with Stefan Szczelkun on 1920-30s Plotlands, Shepperton & Gower

Plotlands and the Housing Crisis by Stefan Szczelkun

What can we learn from the plotlands, that started in the 1920s and 1930s, that could solve the current housing crisis? The key thing is that one starts with something cheap and small and gradually adds to and evolves this starter structure.

1. Land must be made available for self-build development in a way that does not make the plots prohibitively expensive. Ideally maintaining agricultural value per plot. This might imply a legislative change in planning permissions.

2. This might mean some kind of organisation structure that obtains and holds the land for this use. Users could get secure land tenure when they had proved their commitment and availability to build. Resale could only recoup investment made in building materials etc. Additional value might go back into providing more land.

3. Planners would have to be ready to accept a rough and ready aesthetic to start with. With the knowledge from plotlands that the houses will gradually achieve a more coherent architectural aesthetic as they develop over a decade or two. The appreciation of improvisation might require a light hand from Building regulation and planning? Keeping in mind their higher purpose of communal well-being.

4. A motorhome could provide basic amenities at first as the building goes through its initial stages. ie groundwork and initial shelter. Cost of a second-hand motorhome or converting a van could be as low as £5000.

5. The cost of initial ground works (ideally collectivised for 10 or more dwellings) and basic enclosure would constitute a basic level of investment. It would be good if this could be in the region of £20 – £30,000. At this point permanent occupation as a first home would be expected in exchange for security of tenure and a rent to pay back land costs.

6. The initial shelter might be as simple as a single living space with kitchen and bathroom as per motorhome technology. The structure of this space might be a factory made and insulated timber structure. Or, depending on the site and building skills available, the walls might be rammed earth, straw bale, stone or other material as available locally. Recycling of window and door units?
Designed so additional rooms can be added to external walls or through subdivision of the internal space with internal panels.

7. An architectural reference to the ‘Low cost, loose fit, low energy, long life’. Promoted by Alex Gordon in 1972 also Alison Ravetz.

8. This could be applied to multi-storey re-used structure – with a more challenging aesthetics? (although they could be developed behind an agreed skin/ cladding.
Multi-storey flats would be built by a co-operative of builders that included training in required skills.
Groups plan the internal layout and surface finishes of their own flats.

9. The original plotlands used railway carriages, showman’s wagons or buses as the starter shelter. There could be a national reuse of all lorry bodies and larger vans coming to the end of their mechanical life. These might only need insulation and ventilation to be useful.

10. More abstractly: a. The working class produces all value including housing. b. The UK Plotlands shows us what was possible when working class people were allowed half a chance in the 1920s and 1930s. Surviving examples needs to be recognised and protected as our working class cultural heritage. This recognition that we have the power to directly solve our basic human needs is empowering.

11. National extent: Bower, Richard 2021. Lost plotlands: regulatory consequences of forgotten places. Town Planning Review 92 (5) , pp. 643-666. 10.3828/tpr.2021.8
Bowers points to the significance of JA Steers (1944) remarkable walked survey of the British coast in which he identified plotlands as ‘areas of bad scattered development’!
Full Res maps and paper here: https://orca.cardiff.ac.uk/id/eprint/135909/1/R%20Bower%202020%20Plotlands%20TPR%20post%20print.pdf

Set amongst the houseboat community on the Thames near Fulham, A.P.Herbert’s popular 1930 novel, The Water Gypsies, portrayed a collection of people at odds with society. Colin Ward and Dennis Hardy’s research saved Plotlands from the oblivion of official planning histories

Photographer Jason Orton and writer Ken Worpole documented the changing landscape and coastline of Essex and East Anglia, particularly its estuaries, islands and urban edgelands. In 2013 they published their second book, The New English Landscape (Field Station | London, 2013), the second edition of which was published in 2015.

Down by the river

Hundreds of ACORN members shut down conference in bailiff day of action

October 16, 2025
https://acorntheunion.org.uk/acorn-members-shut-down-conference-in-bailiff-action/

Hundreds of ACORN members from across England and Wales came together in Leeds this week for the first national day of action in our Bailiff Free Britain campaign.

Over 300 members from branches across the country disrupted the annual conference of the Civil Court Users Association, one of the main events for bailiff and debt collection companies. The conference hosted representatives from some of Britain’s largest enforcement firms, but when ACORN arrived, they didn’t stick around for long. Members filled the building, hung banners from the balconies, and within minutes the event was abandoned.

With the building taken over, ACORN members inside hosted our own panel on the fight for a Bailiff Free Britain. Members shared experiences of being in council tax debt, bailiff harassment, and the impact on families and communities. Together we made it clear that the days of bullying and intimidation for profit are numbered.

After shutting down the conference, members marched to Leeds Civic Hall where a group occupied the lobby to demand that Leeds City Council and Cllr Asghar Khan meet with ACORN Leeds. The council had ignored requests for a meeting for months, but after hundreds of members arrived and made themselves heard, Cllr Khan came down to meet us in person. A formal meeting to discuss ACORN’s demands and the wider campaign was quickly confirmed.

The Leeds action was part of ACORN’s national Bailiff Free Britain campaign, which is calling for an end to the use of bailiffs to collect council tax debt and for fairer, more supportive alternatives. Across England and Wales, council tax debt has now reached almost £7 billion, and more than 1.4 million households were referred to bailiffs last year. Meanwhile, bailiff companies are making tens of millions of pounds in profit while people already struggling through the cost of living crisis are being pushed even deeper into debt.

ACORN is demanding an end to the use of bailiffs for council tax collection, proper support for people in arrears, caps on excessive fees, an end to imprisonment for non-payment, and a fairer alternative to the council tax system. These changes would protect millions of people and stop councils from relying on private companies that profit from poverty.

SIGN OUR OPEN LETTER HERE https://acornuk.good.do/englandcampaigns/bailiff_letter/

The day in Leeds showed what happens when working-class people stand together. Hundreds of members forced the bailiff industry to abandon its own conference, won a meeting with the council after months of being ignored, and made our demands impossible to ignore.

From Leeds to Cardiff to Bristol, ACORN members are proving that when communities get organised, we can take on powerful industries and win. The fight for a Bailiff Free Britain has only just begun, join ACORN today to be a part of it.

Country’s first community-owned farm in north Shropshire to double in size after donation

But the expanding group better watch out for sophisticated infiltration, so they don’t go down the heartbreaking routes of Robin Page’s Countryside Restoration Trust and Dorset’s Monkton Wyld Court

https://www.shropshirestar.com/news/farming/2025/09/16/countrys-first-community-owned-farm-in-north-shropshire-to-double-in-size-after-donation-but-theres-a-twist/

A north Shropshire farm that became the first in the country to be community-owned is set to double in size after being gifted a second farm.

Fordhall Organic Farm, near Market Drayton, became England’s first community-owned farm in 2006, after a national campaign saved it from industrial development.

Faced with eviction in 2005, the family behind the farm raised enough money through 8,000 non-profit shareholders to purchase the 126-acre site. Since then, the farm has thrived under the leadership of tenant farmer Ben Hollins and his sister Charlotte – children of Arthur Hollins who turned the farm organic.

Now, Fordhall Farm has announced that it will double in size thanks to the generous donation of a second farm – but there’s a twist.

The farm that is being gifted is not in Market Drayton, nor is it in Shropshire, but incredibly, 200 miles away in Devon.

West Town Farm, near Exeter, is a 170-acre organic beef and sheep enterprise. Like Fordhall, it hosts a wide range of community activities including arts, community gardening, camping, weddings and community events, and also boasts a farm shop.

Its current owner, Andy Bragg, said he believes that farms should be at the “heart of rural communities”, and, as he approaches retirement, has decided to gift the farm to the Fordhall Community Land Initiative to ensure that West Town’s community ethos continues.

Charlotte Hollins, General Manager at Fordhall Community Land Initiative said: “The similarities between West Town and Fordhall are striking. Both are organic, pasture-for-life livestock farms and have community at our heart.

“We both want to show a different direction for farming and understand the importance of retaining those connections to the land both within our communities as well as the soil. We have also both been described as slightly quirky, different and even crack-pot at times!

“Dad (late Arthur Hollins) and Andy are such similar characters. The charitable structure of Fordhall Community Land Initiative means that the amazing work begun by Andy in Devon can be continued and secured well into the future, alongside the work of Dad, at Fordhall. Both with local people fully involved in the process.”

The transfer of the farm to Fordhall will not be completed until 2027, allowing time for legal and governance structures to be finalised.

In the meantime, existing staff at West Town, including Andy, will continue running the farm, while the Fordhall Community Land Initiative will provide support and guidance, drawing on nearly 20 years of experience in community farm ownership.

“I suppose some people will think it’s strange to give my farm away,” said Andy.

“I don’t want West Town Farm to be gobbled up by some giant agri-business. What I care about is that the farm’s place in the community and locality. I want the farm to benefit everyone and I know that giving it to Fordhall Community Land Initiative will ensure this happens.

“Fordhall’s values are strongly aligned and gifting West Town Farm to ordhall will protect West Town Farm’s mission and values. Although we are 200 miles apart, the synergy between us means we are both on the same path.

“Learning together, supporting each other and playing a part in our local communities. Whether that is hosting school visits, art groups or barn dances etc, and the local community will always be welcome.”

How Labour bowed to corporate landlords – and it’s already backfiring

Build-to-rent companies are in line for a windfall while private landlords get squeezed

SEE ALSO Who’s Really Buying Up Britain? (The Data Will Shock You) by British Home Group

Ruby Hinchliffe

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/money/property/how-labour-support-corporate-landlords-come-back-bite/

Rachel Reeves bowed to corporate landlords in her Budget just as she mounted a fresh raid on ordinary families with incomes from second properties.

Private landlords now face tens of thousands of pounds in additional bills, from tax to licensing and energy improvements – while build-to-rent developers are on track for a £3bn windfall.

Many of these firms – which include FTSE 100 companies and even banks – have long lobbied successive governments in an effort to squeeze smaller, private landlords out.

Deputy prime minister, Angela Rayer, was photographed just last month whispering in the ear of Larry Finks, BlackRock’s chief executive.

Grainger UK, whose biggest shareholder is BlackRock, currently owns over 11,000 rental homes. It is believed to be the biggest corporate landlord in England.

Legal & General (L&G) also claims to have poured over £3bn into rental investments to date.

Even Britain’s biggest bank, Lloyds, is honing in on the opportunity. Its build-to-rent company Citra Living now owns 5,000 properties and counting.

“Behind closed doors, Labour tends to be supportive of build-to-rent – but not in public,” one industry insider told The Telegraph.

Some Labour politicians have already staked a claim in the corporate landlord market. London Mayor and “renters champion”, Sadiq Khan, has said he wants to raise £187m come 2030 by building rental homes near Transport for London (TfL) stations.

To achieve this, Mr Khan needs to more than quadruple the number of rental homes on TfL’s books, from 4,000 to 20,000, by 2031. As of this year, TfL had started building 4,000 rental units – of which only around 1,500 have been delivered to date.

Dan Wilson Craw, of campaign group Generation Rent, said profit-driven institutional landlords had been linked to “unaffordable rent increases”.

He said: “Some [tenants] have had better experiences than renting from individuals with a small portfolio, but being corporate doesn’t inherently equate professionalism and long-term tenancies.

“While some pension funds [investors of build-to-rent] appear committed to longer tenancies, with limited annual rent rises, we’ve heard reports of other investment funds seeking to maximise profits through unaffordable rent increases and evictions.”

‘Are we building the ghettos of the future?’

Build-to-rent flats are often advertised as being “more energy efficient” than private rental homes, but as some residents in Wembley have found out – that’s not always the case.

Speaking to The Telegraph earlier this year, tenants of Quintain Living – a US-owned company – said they were paying 86pc more for their energy bills than the average Londoner.

This was in spite of the company advertising average savings of “56pc” on utility bills, thanks to every flat boasting an energy performance certificate rating of “B”.

A Quintain spokesman has since blamed a planning consent order, which required the developer to build two district heat networks to supply heat and hot water to the buildings.

In another case in Croydon, south London, residents in one of L&G’s £3,000 a month “luxury” build-to-rent developments have spent the last year fighting for better living conditions.

Reports from My London and Inside Croydon in September quoted some of the 251 tenants whose pets had even fallen ill from mould, which was first exposed by campaigner Kwajo Tweneboa.

Others reported collapsed ceilings and severe water leaks. L&G has since begun to fix the issues which it blamed on a “build quality issue”.

Richard Upton, a social developer and a visiting fellow at the University of Reading, said he “worries” when he sees schemes of thousands of flats going up.

“Is that a place for people to live for 20 years? With just a coffee shop underneath? This is where we need to be thinking more about mixed use, adding parks and other amenities.

“Such is the rate of inflation and the cost of new things, that those in new-build flats – especially in London – can just about afford to exist. It’s a good thing if income-to-rent ratios one day come down, if we build enough. But at what cost? Are we building the ghettos of the future?

“I fear there is a risk of quality being overlooked in the race for units. The Government wants to build 1.5 million homes. The industry calls them units.”

Rent premiums

It’s not just the varying quality of new builds erected at pace that’s worrying. Often, rents for new-builds carry a 10pc premium – much like new-build sales.

Britain’s biggest landlord, Grainger UK, collects nearly £100m in rent each year.

In May, the London Renters Union campaign group protested outside Grainger UK’s head office accusing the company of “getting rich gentrifying our city’s neighbourhoods” and “lobbying [the] Government against our rights”.

In a thread on X, formerly Twitter, the campaign group also accused the company of putting up luxury flats for rent in historically working-class areas such as Tottenham or Canning Town which are “wildly unaffordable for local people”.

“Corporate landlords and developers are tearing our communities apart, pushing us out while lining their own pockets,” one of their tweets reads.

A member of the campaign group living in Seven Sisters claimed they were forced out by a 50pc rent increase, after their landlord cited a nearby Grainger UK development as “the new market rent”.

Grainger UK disputed this and said its Seven Sisters development, Apex Gardens, is regulated by the Government’s Regulator of Social Housing and includes a high proportion of affordable homes on rents below the open market.

Grainger UK told The Telegraph that rather than lobbying against renters’ rights, it has publicly supported Labour’s Renters’ Rights Bill.

In September this year, in an official London stock market announcement, Grainger Uk said it “looks forward to continuing to use its expertise to help inform and shape the final legislation”.

A spokesman for Grainger UK said that tenants of the company in London spend just “28pc” of their incomes on rent and that it has “no control over other landlords’ pricing”.

Costly legal challenges

The challenges that come with corporate landlords are already playing out abroad. In Berlin, where 85pc of residents are renters, at least 250,000 homes are owned by corporations.

Their shareholders benefit from around 41 cents of every euro tenants pay in rent on average, according to the research arm of consumer lobby group Finanzwende.

Unprecedented rises in rents, paired with poor maintenance, has sparked city-wide protests and referendums to transfer ownership of the homes back to the state after it sold them off in the 1990s.

The city’s largest renter association told The Telegraph last year that while individual landlords typically raise rents by around 20pc, corporate ones will raise them by as much as 50pc.

One thing which is worrying England’s corporate landlords – despite all the well-received lobbying – is Labour’s plan to get rid of powers to write rent increases into contracts, as part of its Renters’ Rights Bill.

This change, once in legislation, will force corporations to serve tenants with rent notices which – unlike contracted rent increases – can be challenged in a tribunal if they do not reflect the “market rate”.

If tenants were to start challenging rent increases en masse, this could pose a serious risk to the income of these listed companies and their shareholders.

Some law firms have even suggested such “restrictions” on in-tenancy rent increases could lead to deep-pocketed landlords waging costly future legal challenges against the Labour government – particularly if rents fail to keep pace with market inflation.