COUNCIL ACTION OVER GYPSY HOMES

Fences and paving have been put on the site

A council has begun enforcement action at a Gypsy development in Warwickshire.

Sixteen Gypsy families moved on to land they own at Darlingscott on 21 March and set up facilities, including electricity supplies and hardstanding.

Stratford-on-Avon District Council has served a temporary stop notice to stop more mobile homes or caravans moving on to the site it calls "unauthorised".

However, the Gypsies at the site say they have nowhere else to go and the council has not listened to them.

The council said its officers had visited the site on the A429, near Shipston-on-Stour, over the last few days "to obtain more information".

It said the temporary stop notice had been served "under the auspices of planning legislation".

Stratford-on-Avon District Council says it received an application for 16 caravan pitches, hardstandings and 16 utility blocks the day before the Gypsies moved there.

But it called the site, which was set up during the Easter Bank Holiday weekend, "unauthorised" and said the application could "not be processed in its current state".

It says it has received about 50 calls from the public and has commissioned a specialist planning barrister for advice.

But Zack Follows, from the site, previously said the Gypsy community had nowhere to go as the council had failed to provide sites for them.