An angry homeowner has been ordered to demolish his extension and wood-burning chimneys by his local council. Gerrard Caughey was slapped with two enforcement notices after Glasgow City Council (GCC) planning chiefs said he built the sunroom without permission.
The furious homeowner has dubbed the decision “nonsense” and has taken his fight to the courts. However, the Scottish Government ruled against him as “the structure does not benefit from either planning permission or listed building consent.” The smoke caused by the wood-burning stoves also annoyed residents in the area.
The extension to the mid-19th-century terraced building was built in 2019. However, inspectors said it was not in character with the property or local area.
As reported by the Mail Online, he said: “I think it’s nonsense. Most folk I speak with in the area love the smell of the smoke, and I use it very occasionally.”
He added: “You can’t even see the garden from out in the street. It’s not causing anyone harm or anything.”
According to Mr Caughey, a builder himself, he built the sunroom with high-quality Spanish hardwood shipped from abroad. He added that the state of the orangery when he moved into the home in the 1990s was “dangerous and a shambles”.
His planning agent said: “GCC enforcement allude to ‘various complaints’ with regards to the structure. We are aware of one complaint from the neighbouring property, and we understand there have been long-running disputes from them.
“My clients are not aware of any further complaints from within the area and we would suggest therefore the word ‘various’ has been used spuriously in the compiling of the GCC report.”
While GCC said no planning permission was ever sought for the extension, Mr Caughey claims they failed to respond to queries about retrospective planning permission. The extension was installed at the back of the property, while two flues for the wood-burning stove were put into place to face the lane that runs to the back of the building.
GCC ordered the removal of both last November. They said the smoke from the chimneys was having a “direct impact on the amenity of the neighbouring properties.”
Some locals said “black smoke” was causing concerns in the area and was visible streets away from the property. One neighbour said: “I don’t have anything to say other than the fact we were not happy. It was not so much the summerhouse as the smoke from the fires which was a big aspect of things.”
However, a second added: “I know about the double chimney but we personally didn’t complain about it. There is a nursery around here though so maybe it affected some of the people who use that.”
A Glasgow City Council spokesman said: “It should be noted that it was the Scottish Government – not Glasgow City Council – which dismissed the appeal on the grounds that the structure does not benefit from either planning permission or listed building consent and that the wood burning stoves were causing disamenity to the surrounding homes.
“It should also be understood that unauthorised alteration of a listed building is a criminal, not civic, offence and therefore carry a higher magnitude of scrutiny.
“The claim that we had withdrawn a notice and that there had been an attempt to submit a planning application is not true, indeed it was admitted that the resident left their application in the drafts section of the online planning process and did not submit it.”