THE OWNERS of a hotel and restaurant have been told they must demolish a large extension built without planning permission after losing an appeal against the Council.

They now have nine months to remove the three storey addition built at the Casa Hotel and Restaurant on Elland Road, Brighouse, following the decision from the Government planning inspector.

A planning inquiry was held earlier this summer following an appeal by Castelite Ltd, the firm behind Casa, over a Calderdale Council enforcement notice calling for the removal of the building and the subsequent refusal of revised plans.

Inspector Ahsan Ghafoor has now dismissed both appeals and ruled that the function room extension must be torn down.

He found that not only was the "unlawful" extension against green belt rules, the only solution was to restore the land to its original condition.

In his judgement, he said: "On balance, the considerations advanced by the appellant in support of granting planning permission do not clearly outweigh the inappropriate nature of the proposed development in the Green Belt and the other identified harms.

"Consequently, the very special circumstances necessary to justify the development do not exist in this case."

The owners had argued that work on the larger extension, which would create around 38 full-time and 50 part-time jobs, began before permission for a smaller extension expired.

But Mr Ghafoor disagreed, saying that taken together the external and internal differences result in a "substantially different development when compared to the scheme approved in 2009" and therefore the express planning permission required had not been obtained.

He did however agree that there would be some economic and social benefit from a specially-designed functions suite and office space, but that it would not be "at the expense of the environment".

Considering whether the building could be revised instead of the extension needing to be demolished, he added: "The appellant considers total demolition is over-enforcement.

"The steps required to comply with the notice seek to remedy the breach by restoring the land to its condition before the breach occurred.

"There is no lawful fall-back position to which the Appellant could revert, because the 2009 permission has expired.

"Therefore, nothing short of total demolition would achieve the notice's purpose and I find that the steps required in the notice are not excessive."

The inspector did however extend the period in which the extension must be demolished from the two months in the original Council enforcement notice, to nine months.

He said this was because quotes from specialist contractors would need to be obtained and the finances put in place, and that any weddings booked may need to be re-organised.

The Council’s development manager, Richard Seaman, said: “The Planning Inspector has dismissed the appeals made in relation to Casa’s proposed extension. This means that the enforcement notice which the Council served last year requiring Casa to remove the extension remains in place. The deadline for complying with this notice is nine months from the date of the Inspector’s decision."

Manager of the hotel and restaurant, Sam Holmes, said he wanted to reiterate that the core of the business was unaffected and that Casa would be open as usual. He added that they were currently taking legal advice as to the next step.