A RECYCLING company that has been using a countryside site for more than 10 years has lost a bid to keep a workshop.

Lockhams Recycling Ltd in Shedfield, between Fareham and Bishop’s Waltham, has seen its retrospective planning permission refused.

A storage area, office and workshop built were all built without planning permission.

A retrospective application was refused for the open storage area for recycled aggregate materials.

The purpose of the application was to provide more storage space for materials, allowing for more efficient processing of imported soils, crushed concrete, and other aggregates from the construction industry.

The Shedfield Equestrian Centre site has several buildings, hardstanding areas, access roads, and equestrian facilities, such as fields.

The site is adjacent to and near various other establishments, including a vehicle repair and MOT test centre, a dog training facility, a marine sales company, and a ground-mounted solar farm.

The company has permission to recycle inert materials and builders’ waste on the land to the west of the application site, which is accessed jointly.

In 2015, a successful appeal meant the firm could process 46,000m³ of imported materials annually, equivalent to 69,000 metric tonnes.

But despite planning permission not being granted to store this material, the area to be extended has already been hard-surfaced.

According to Lockhams Recycling Ltd, the site has been operational as an “unauthorised development storing processed recycled materials” and for an office and a workshop without any planning approvals since November 2020.

The site is open seven days a week from 7am until 6pm, with up to 48 lorry movements per day but a maximum of 100.

Winchester City Council objected to the application.

At a county council planning meeting, Chairman Councillor Peter Latham said the site was covered with trees and the company had taken all of that away without planning permission.

Cllr Latham said: “It’s clear to me that it is not a sustainable development. It’s a respected retrospective application; therefore, we must look at the application not as it is now but as a green field site.

“It clearly does not comply with any of the exceptions which would entail being able to grant permission.

“The most significant picture for me was a picture taken in 2010 which showed this whole site which was covered with trees forestry, it was countryside, and that has all been taken away within the last 12 years without planning permission."