# Forge Farm, Nunhold Road, Shrewley (permanent rural worker's dwelling, outline)

- **Decision:** approved, 28 August 2026
- **Decided by:** Council officer (delegated): Thomas Senior (case officer)
- **Authority:** Warwick (West Midlands)
- **Application reference:** W/26/0134
- **Procedure:** delegated
- **Development:** Outline (access only) for a single-storey self-build essential rural worker's dwelling replacing a temporary caravan at an equine rehabilitation and farriery business
- **Homes:** 1
- **Site context:** green-belt, open-countryside, isolated
- **Green Belt:** yes (grey belt not-argued)
- **Framework applied:** August 2026 NPPF
- **Determinative policies:** HO11(1)(a), GB6(2), GB7
- **Development plan policies:** Warwick District Local Plan 2011-2029 DS18, H1, H12, BE1, BE3, TR1, NE3, Net Zero Carbon DPD NZC1, NZC2
- **Main issues:** rural worker essential need, financial test, Green Belt very special circumstances
- **Tags:** rural-worker-dwelling, vsc-shown, self-build, equestrian, small-scheme

## Summary
Outline permission for a permanent single-storey rural worker's dwelling in the Green Belt at Forge Farm, Shrewley (Claverdon postal area), replacing a temporary caravan at an equine rehabilitation yard. Warwick DC held that a new dwelling is inappropriate development because it is not a GB7 category. It treated a proven HO11(1)(a) essential need as very special circumstances.

## Issues and findings
- **Essential need, HO11(1)(a): PASS.** The specialist consultant "confirms that there would be a continued and justified essential need for a rural worker to be on site to provide 24-hour supervision in order to support and manage an enterprise of this scale and nature" (Report, Rural Housing).
- **Financial test: marginal.** "the net profit for the year ending 5 April 2025 can support the costs of 0.96 of a full-time worker at the current minimum wage … When just taking into account the financial information submitted for Forge Farm Boarding and Rehabilitation, the consultant concluded that the business would not be currently viable" (Rural Housing). It passed once the farriery company accounts were added.
- **Green Belt, GB6/GB7.** "The provision of a new dwelling within the Green Belt is considered inappropriate development … as it does not fall within any of the exceptions stated in Section GB7 … if there is a genuine, well demonstrated need for a worker to be present on site at most times of the day and night, then this should represent very special circumstances" (Green Belt).

## Planning balance
GB6(2) very special circumstances: "the proposed development would achieve very special circumstances through this identified need, provision of housing, appropriate development scale, and site context, such that it would clearly outweigh the harm to the Green Belt" (Green Belt).

## What made the difference
An independently verified 24-hour animal-welfare need on an established, temporarily consented enterprise, plus a modest single-storey form sited next to existing buildings.

## Transferable points
- Warwick DC, like Lichfield (lichfield-26-00849-FUL), treats rural workers' dwellings in the Green Belt as inappropriate, with essential need supplying the very special circumstances. The HO11 essential-need test is the gatekeeper.
- The viability test is strict: a business supporting 0.96 of a full-time worker on its own accounts initially failed.
- Being inappropriate, the scheme needed no GB7(1)(g) or TR3 location analysis, and none was done. This is a separate route from market housing.

## Policy findings
- **HO11(1)(a): pass.** essential need for 24-hour supervision of horses in rehabilitation, confirmed by the Council's independent rural consultant; the business passed the financial test only after the farriery company's accounts were added
- **GB7: fail.** a new dwelling is not a GB7 exception; "well established in appeal decisions that … essential rural workers dwellings should be considered as inappropriate development"
- **GB6(2): pass (substantial weight).** very special circumstances from the demonstrated essential need, modest single-storey scale and siting next to existing buildings
- **DP3: pass.** single-storey, well screened, built form consolidated

## Key facts
- Temporary 3-year caravan for a rural worker granted in 2022 (W/22/1425), following regularisation of farriery and horse treatment use (W/22/0820)
- 4 to 5 horses usually in treatment, fewer than the 6 to 8 projected in 2022
- Boarding and rehabilitation accounts alone supported only 0.96 of a full-time worker at the current minimum wage (about £27,962). The consultant initially found the business not viable until the Shoe U Farriers Ltd accounts were supplied.
- No public objections; Shrewley Parish Council did not object, subject to viability
- Self-build, so exempt from statutory BNG; the Council declined to impose the ecologist's BNG condition

## Sources
- https://planningdocuments.warwickdc.gov.uk/online-applications/applicationDetails.do?activeTab=summary&keyVal=_WARWI_DCAPR_99350
- https://planningdocuments.warwickdc.gov.uk/online-applications/files/D92680A8E24DA91F495806FD5E22C931/pdf/W_26_0134-Delegated_Report-2016159.pdf

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Source: https://planningdistilled.org/research/england/nppf-navigator/decisions/warwick-W-26-0134.html

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