Somerset farmers could soon be forced to sell their land so Bath & North East Somerset Council can build a £30 million business park on it.
Locals braved rainy weather to protest at the site earlier this year | Photo © John Wimperis
The council wants to turn fields next to Midsomer Norton’s Old Mills Batch “volcano” into “an exemplar net zero green business park”.
The Somer Valley Enterprise Zone — or “SVEZ” — is intended to create 1,300 jobs but the plans have been hugely controversial, sparking protests in the local area and an emotional plea from the farmers affected for the council to abandon the plan.
In February, the council cabinet passed a “local development order” essentially granting planning permission in advance for companies to develop the site.
Now the council cabinet has agreed to make a compulsory purchase order to force farmers to sell them the land if they will not agree to part with it.
Cllr Paul Roper, the council’s cabinet member for economic and cultural sustainable development, told the meeting of the council cabinet on 11th July: “This is not a decision to be taken lightly and if these powers are granted we will only use them absolutely necessarily and as a last resort.”
He said: “To deliver this scheme requires the acquisition of at least 47 separate parcels of land from 40 landowners.
“It is hoped that most if not all of the land purchases can be carried out on the basis of willing buyer and seller and negotiations continue to try and secure land on this basis.
“What we cannot allow to happen is for the scheme to fail because any one of the multiple land interests cannot be acquired on a voluntary basis.
“It is therefore deemed necessary to have the powers to compel and these powers are enshrined in a compulsory purchase order.”
The council voted unanimously to make the compulsory purchase order. As well as the fields which will form the SVEZ, the CPO also covers areas around roads set to be affected by the plans on the edge of Midsomer Norton and in nearby Farrington Gurney.
Landowners will all be contacted with a questionnaire. If landowners object to the proposed compulsory purchase order, the matter will go to a public inquiry.
Cllr Roper said: “What we are doing here is delivering an exemplar net zero green business park, creating around 1,300 jobs of the type that we aspire to.
“That’s good quality, secure, well-paid, fulfilling, and local employment. We are convinced that this will provide a much-needed and significant economic boost to the local area and to the authority as a whole.”
Seconding the motion for the compulsory purchase orders, the council’s cabinet member for children’s services, Paul May, said: “Many of the traditional major employers in the area have disappeared. This has created a real community need for more employment, including to provide young people with local job opportunities and training.”
He added: “This local authority does not ever lightly use CPO powers but this is a case of the subregional need versus the local concerns.”
Concerned locals, including Bath and North East Somerset councillors Ann Morgan (High Littleton, Liberal Democrat) and Sam Ross (Clutton and Farmborough, Green), have twice held protests by the site against the plans.
Campaigners have pointed out the area already has a low unemployment rate and warned plans for a pub on the business park could draw customers away from existing establishments.
Cllr Roper said: “I am acutely aware of the sensitivities of this and also the implications it has on the landowners affected. I am also aware of the continued resistance by some to the creation of this employment site.
“What we do believe however is that the benefits to the local communities associated with the creation of the SVEZ do justify the use of this land — indeed for the CPO to be successful we must pass certain prescribed tests for viability.”
The farm most affected by the plans is Royal Oak Farm, much of which will be absorbed by the business park which will “overshadow” the farmhouse and cut off access to the north part of their farm.
When the council cabinet passed the local development order to allow the SVEZ to be developed without planning permission in February, Barry and Morag Flowers — whose family have owned Royal Oak Farm for over 70 years — travelled to the meeting in Bath to urge the council to drop the plan.
Ms Flowers told councillors: “Barry took over the running of [Royal Oak Farm] at the age of 21. We have farmed and looked after this land for the last 54 years.
“We raised a family here and have a grandson of 18 who wishes to carry on the tradition of farming on the farm he has grown up on.
“The Somer Valley Enterprise Zone and this local development order tears apart our plans and aspirations for the future of our farm, especially our grandson’s.”
She added that the farm was grade one agricultural land and said that they had suffered “untold stress and anxiety” from the uncertainty over the project — which has been discussed for seven years. She warned that it would cut their yearly income in half.
Ms Flowers said: “How can it be that B&NES is going to tear up this prime agricultural land that is used for food consumption to build an industrial park that the majority of local people do not want or see the need for?”
At the meeting, councillor — and orchard owner — Matt McCabe (Bathavon South, Liberal Democrat) told Mr and Mrs Flowers he understood how they felt because he had previously had his land allocated in council plans, although it did not end up being developed.
But he said: “Is it really the case that we value a field of brassicas over the future prosperity of our young people?”
It is hoped that the first jobs at the “green business park” will arrive in 3-4 years, although it could take up to a decade for the site to be fully developed.
The fields by Old Mills Batch were first allocated as land for employment by the council in 2007 but businesses did not step forward with plans for the site. It became an “enterprise zone” in 2017 but businesses will miss out on associated fiscal benefits, as these expired in 2022.
How much will the council pay out?
Mr Roper that landowners would receive a “fair price” for their land, even if forced to sell. The exact figure for how much the council is prepared to pay landowners to get the land was included in a report which was restricted from public view.
However a report which went before the council cabinet in February said the council was requesting £9.3 million of grant funding from the West of England Combined Authority for “project development costs such as land assembly and detailed technical design”.
That report put the total cost of the next stage project at £29.9 million.
In the papers for Thursday’s council cabinet meeting, the costs of “highway and enabling works” were put at £19.6 million. This will be funded by grant funding won by the council from various sources.
John Wimperis, Local Democracy Reporter
