Game Over: Homeowner Ordered to Tear Down Fence After Appeal Rejected
- Apr 5
- 2 min read
From Garden to Battleground: Homeowner Loses High-Stakes Planning Fight With Local Council.
5th April 2026
A Hartlepool homeowner has failed in a bid to overturn a planning enforcement notice after the governments Planning Inspector dismissed the appeal, instead ruling in favour of the local council.
The case centred on land at Low Throston House, Netherby Gate in Hartlepool, where homeowner Andrew Haygarth challenged action taken by Hartlepool Borough Council over what the council claimed to have been unauthorised changes to land use and the erection of a boundary fence.
In a decision issued on the 30th of March 2026 following a site visit a month earlier, the Planning Inspectorate rejected two separate appeals lodged by Mr Haygarth — one seeking to prove the development was lawful, with the other aiming to quash the enforcement notice altogether.
Fence and Land Use at Heart of Dispute
The dispute focused on a stretch of land that had been enclosed and incorporated into the garden of a newly built bungalow. Council planning officers argued the land had been unlawfully absorbed into the residential curtilage of the property without planning permission — a claim the homeowner strongly contested.
However, the inspector last month concluded that the land had not previously been used as part of any residential garden and that enclosing it with a fence amounted to a material change of use, requiring planning consent.
In dismissing the appeal, the inspector found that the homeowner failed to demonstrate that the land had been in continuous residential use for the required 10-year period needed to make it lawful. As a result, the application for a lawful development certificate was refused.
The inspector also backed the council’s enforcement action, confirming that the notice should remain in place — albeit with minor amendments. Those changes included clarifying the wording of the breach and extending the compliance period from two months to three.
No Legal Errors Found
The decision also dismissed arguments that there'd been no breach of planning control, or that the enforcement action was excessive. The inspector ruled that the fence and associated works were integral to the unauthorised use of the land and could therefore be lawfully required to be removed — even if the fence itself might otherwise have been permitted development.
Under the notice, the homeowner must now restore the boundary fence to its original approved position as well as removing any associated structures and materials linked to the unauthorised works, with the work having to be complete within three months of the order.
