Statue of Lord Nelson will not be allowed to stay

A statue of Lord Nelson, standing together with the captain of his fleet, will not be allowed to stay in Chichester permanently after a planning application was turned down.

In 2020 permission was given for five years to erect the resin and bronze statue of Nelson and Sir George Murray outside The Council House, Murray's former home, in North Street.

A one-year extension was granted in 2025 and the city council submitted an application to leave the sculpture in place for good.

But the proposal has been turned down by a planning officer on the grounds that, over time, the resin would deteriorate, causing harm to the Conservation Area and the setting of the Grade II* listed building.

A statement from the council's conservation and design officer said: "The statue is resin, and even with high quality components and the correct maintenance this has a relatively short lifespan of 10-30 years in an external setting."

They said the statue had been outside for a number of years already and it would "fade, soften and crack as time progresses", according to the Local Democracy Reporting Service.

Other statues in Chichester are bronze and "will weather and age in a manner consistent with the historic buildings," the council says.

While the statue was "not without merit", the officer added: "The statue is strangely proportioned, it is at a scale less than 100 percent of an adult human."

The officer continued: "This is in contrast to the approach traditionally taken in the public realm which sees statues scaled at above 100 percent in order to emphasise their impact."

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