Friday September 26th 2025
The Heddle, Gifford
Written by Local Democracy Reporter, Marie Sharp
A home owner has been told he cannot turn his paddock into a garden despite providing sworn statements that said he has cut the grass and cared for it for over a decade.
Keith Hare owns the paddock alongside his home The Heddle, in Gifford, and has lived there since the beginning of 2015 but an application to turn it into a domestic garden has been refused by East Lothian Council planners who say there is no proof it has been used that way.
Photographs of Mr Hare cutting the grass of the paddock were provided to officers along with sworn statements saying it had been looked after as if it was a garden with ‘children, nieces, nephews and grandchildren’ playing in it over the years.
And it was acknowledged by planners that permission to turn part of the paddock into garden space with a summer house in the past had been granted.
However officers said the application for a Certificate of Lawfulness declaring the whole paddock part of the house garden could not be supported saying photographs of it being cared for were not dated and the sworn statement did not provide the evidence needed to show it had been in constant use for over a decade.
They said: “The information submitted with this application does not demonstrate that the grass paddock field has been in continuous use as domestic garden ground serving the house named ‘The Heddle’ for a period of 10 years or more.
“No other supporting factual documentation has been submitted to demonstrate, on the balance of probability, that the grass paddock field has been in continuous use as domestic garden ground serving the house named ‘The Heddle’ for a period of 10 years or more in order for it to be considered lawful.
“Accordingly, this application should therefore be refused, and a Certificate of Lawfulness should not be issued.”
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