Council faces legal bill over caravan park row

A council has been ordered to pay legal costs to a caravan park after government inspectors said it had shown "unreasonable behaviour".

The owners of Cornish Farm Touring Park, based near the M5 just outside Taunton, Somerset, applied for planning permission to formalise use the site as a caravan park in June 2025.

After Somerset Council refused permission, the park owner appealed the decision, resulting in a public inquiry in June.

Planning inspector Roy Curnow ruled against the council and ordered it to pay the caravan park's legal costs due to "unreasonable behaviour" during the appeal process.

The exact amount of costs awarded to the park has not yet been specified, the Local Democracy Reporting Service said.

Under the original planning permission, which was issued in 2000, the site's owner Sovereign Park Homes Estates Ltd was told up to 25 pitches on the site could be made available at any one time, with occupation being limited to 28 consecutive days.

Somerset Council contended that the occupation limit was "no longer enforceable" and had been "continuously breached for a period of 10 years".

Curnow, from the government's Planning Inspectorate, visited the site on 10 June, where he noted the site contained 48 pitches according to a map found in reception.

He said: "There is no control on either the length of time that a caravan might be sited on the land, nor on the type of caravan that might be used."

During the hearing, Somerset Council argued that allowing for a "greater year-round presence" of caravans on the site would create a "change of character" and increase traffic.

Curnow dismissed this argument, saying: "There are simply no restrictions on using caravans on the land for residential purposes.

"Therefore, the effects on character referred to by the council could happen anyway, and there would be no material change in the character of the land."

The order for Somerset Council to pay the park owners' legal costs came as a result of the council's "unreasonable behaviour leading to unnecessary expense", including the failure to make a "timely and correct decision", Curnow said.

He also ruled its arguments regarding the length of occupancies was "fundamentally flawed and not substantiated".

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