Family face £40k bill after being ordered to tear down garden annexe

A couple who built an annexe in their back garden have been ordered to tear it down or face a £40,000 redesign after it was built 10 metres out of place - despite council officials telling them to move it there. 

Tracy and Paul Allen, from Gillingham, Kent, received planning permission to erect the property at the back of their garden by Medway Council. 

They then moved it forward to satisfy fire safety concerns, taking orders from Medway building control officials. 

Once the £80,000 annexe was built, they received an enforcement notice accusing them of constructing the building in the wrong place - and have now lost a planning appeal, leaving them facing demolition or a costly £40,000 alteration. 

The couple have condemned what they see as a staggering council muddle, with one arm of Medway approving the plans, another telling them to move the building - and then being punished for doing so. 

'We're absolutely devastated if I'm being honest - just the whole stress of it all,' Mrs Allen told the Daily Mail. 'How can Medway Council sign off a building if it's too far away from the property and doesn't meet fire regulations?

'They should have said in the first place "no, you can't have it there - you've got to bring it further forward".

'And the council's building control people never said, "because we've told you to move it forward, you need to go back to planning".' 

She added: 'We would have done that. We just did what we thought was the right thing.'

The couple, who run a charity supporting children and adults with learning difficulties, built the single-story annexe to provide accommodation for a disabled young person they care for.

Medway Council officials signed off their plans in 2019, agreeing that the 5.6m-tall building could be constructed towards the rear of their long back garden.

But the couple claim that when building control became involved, they were told the approved position was too far from the roadside for fire crews to reach with a hose - and that the annexe would need to come 10 metres forward.

Building control in Medway is conducted by STG Partnership - set up as a joint venture by four neighbouring councils.

Believing they were following direct official instructions, the Allens made the change and carried on building.

By February 2024, however, the council had issued enforcement papers alleging the annexe was in the wrong location, ordering the couple to either demolish it entirely or carry out costly alterations to make it smaller.

Mrs Allen, 58, said she was left stunned - believing she and her husband had complied with the council at every stage.

'When we went to the council with the proposal, we sat down and spoke about the annexe and what we were proposing, and the council agreed. So that got passed,' she said. 

'When the building control came along, they told us we couldn't have it there because of the fire regulations, because it was too far away from the curb side.

'They said you've just got to move it up by 10 metres and then that will be fine. We said "okay then".

'They emailed us and said these are your options, this is what we're telling you you've got to do.

'They never said to us at any point that we needed to go back and get permission again for the move. They never said you've got to go back for retrospective permission, we didn't even know what that meant.

'We just moved it, then after we moved it where they told us to - to satisfy the building control - they came back at every stage and passed it off.

'So we built it to the specification, 100 per cent, to what the planning people had told us to do.'

The couple said they assumed departments within the same council would be in conversation with each other. 

Instead, they claim they were left totally unaware that moving the building to satisfy building control would require fresh planning permission.

The Allens said they only discovered there was a serious problem while the annexe was being built - leaving them facing the nightmare prospect of tearing down or radically altering a structure they thought had effectively been signed off.

The couple tried to salvage the situation by asking whether the annexe could simply be altered.

She added: 'We honestly thought they were in the same department as Medway Council, because we paid for that as part of the service.

'We thought planning and building control were linked, and would probably have some sort of conversation with each other.

'We had no knowledge that they weren't.

'We went back to Medway Council and asked if we could just slightly alter it, and they said no, you've got to go in and do another application.

'So we did another application and they were in no way negotiating - they weren't taking any responsibility.'

The Allens were told to submit a retrospective planning application for the annexe - featuring a less imposing roof - which was approved in 2022.

Medway council took enforcement notice two years later, claiming that no remedial work had taken place.

The couple lost an appeal at the independent Planning Inspectorate this month.

There, inspector Ahsan Ghafoor ruled the annexe in its current position had a 'materially harmful effect' on neighbours' living conditions.

The ruling means the couple must now either demolish the annexe entirely or make a string of changes to reduce the 'over-dominant and over-towering effect' - including replacing its pitched roof.

Those changes, according to the Allens, could cost upwards of £40,000.

Mrs Allen said: 'We probably spent about £80,000 building it.

'And we haven't even finished it - so everything inside is done, all the plastering is done, all we need to do is put in the kitchen and the bathroom.

'The damage it's going to cause to take the roof off and get a new roof, I reckon it could be about £40,000, maybe more.

'It's still going to be there, it's still going to be in that location, it's still going to be quite high, but it's just going to be a different shape.'

Mrs Allen said the couple had no intention of upsetting neighbours and had built the annexe to future-proof themselves.

She added: 'It's for ourselves and also we care for a young person who is disabled.

'I had a hip replacement when I was 50, I probably will need another, and me and my husband have arthritis.

'We've always been caring for the elderly in our families so we didn't really want to go into a home, and the young person we care for we want to be able to give him the best possible opportunities for his lifestyle.

'So we thought what we could do is build the annexe, possibly for our old age, and also possibly to accommodate the young person.

'We were trying to take a bit of control of our futures.'

Medway Council did not respond to the direct claims made by Mr and Mrs Allen.

It said in a statement: 'As the approved amendments to the design of the annexe were not made following the successful retrospective planning application, an enforcement notice was issued.

'The Planning Inspectorate has reviewed the appeal, and found in favour of the council.'