Roundhouse

[BDG]

(30 December 2012, 10:04)bigpaul Wrote: that may be so in that one case but here in England the minimum criteria seems to be you must earn money from your land and it has to be at least the same amount as you would get on the dole, and that isnt possible with only a couple of acres.

I am in England and you are incorrect.

As I stated, there was a test case - Petter and Harris v Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and The Regions and Another Court of Appeal 15 March 1999 - where it was determined the rules should not be interpreted in the way that they are written and instead the intent of the rule should be applied.

It was judged that the rule regarding commercial viability was put in place to stop people building under conditions of agricultural occupancy and then winding up the agricultural business and selling the home(s) as residential dwellings.

It was also judged that the rule was written with thought given to commercial farming rather than subsistence farming and that in the case of subsistence farming, rather than the profitability rule be applied, instead the meaning behind the rule should be asked - is the agricultural activity likely to continue.

If the answer to that is yes, then all rules regarding how much an agricultural business does or does not make go out of the window. If a husband is running an agricultural business and has a dwelling related to conditions of agricultural occupancy, it could be the wife works elsewhere and uses her income to support the business. It matters not, as long as the land is being used for agriculture.