Lord Lieutenant wins court battle (From Wilts and Gloucestershire Standard)

Lord Lieutenant wins court battle

FURIOUS farmer Ian Courtenay Dennis has accused the Queen's official representative in Gloucestershire of 'destroying' him.

He lashed out after his landlord, county Lord Lieutenant Henry Elwes, had won a court battle which will result in Mr Dennis being evicted from his Cotswold farm.

The tenant farmer had taken Old Etonian and former Scots Guards officer Mr Elwes to court in a bid to reverse a notice to quit served on him by the Lord Lieutenant's Colesbourne Estate in December 2000.

But Mr Dennis failed in his action against Mr Elwes at Gloucester County Court where a judge ruled that he must leave the farm he has occupied for the last 21 years.

Mr Elwes, who owns the huge Colesbourne Park Estate had served notice on the pheasant farmer on the grounds that he had failed to maintain the listed farmhouse and buildings properly.

After losing the two day court battle, Mr Dennis said Mr Elwes' notice to get him out of Staple Farm, Colesbourne Road, Withington, had 'destroyed' him.

Accused by his landlord of failing to carry out repairs to the Grade II listed farmhouse, barn and outbuildings, the 51 year-old, his wife Gill, and their three children aged 16, 18 and 24, now have just three months to find a new home.

"There's no way we can get out in that time, it's impossible," said Mr Dennis.

"It's my busy time. I work 17 to 20 hours a day through June, July and August hatching the pheasants.

"Henry Elwes won't give up on his legal costs either," he added. "He's destroyed me."

The relationship between the game farmer and Mr Elwes - the Queen's official representative in Gloucestershire and a former Tory chairman of the county council - began in 1981 when Mr Dennis signed a contract leasing Staple Farm for just £175 a year.

The rent was nominal on the basis that Mr Dennis kept the farm and its buildings in 'good and substantial repair' - even to the point of rebuilding or replacing damaged property.

By December 2000, according to Mr Elwes, he had grown tired of 'chivvying' Mr Dennis to perform repairs and maintenance work and a notice for his eviction was served.

Mr Dennis fought the notice by taking the case to court in a bid to stay at the property.

On Monday and Tuesday this week, the court heard how the farmer failed to maintain the property in a good state of repair, leaving boundary fences incomplete, residential and farm buildings undecorated and the main barn - where Mr Dennis housed incubators and hatchers for his pheasant rearing business - in need of a new roof which would have cost between £25,000 and £50,000.

Representing himself, Mr Dennis, who earns around £25,000 a year from his enterprise, insisted repairs were regularly carried out and that he would complete work to boundary markers and the roof barn if granted a three year extension to his lease by the court.

But Judge Benjamin Browne said Mr Dennis' previous record for failing to deal with repairs, and lack of available funds, meant he had to rule in favour of Mr Elwes and the Colesbourne Estate.

"It must be proved there was substantial neglect of repair and that the neglect is a breach of obligations under Mr Dennis' lease," he said.

"In my view it is clear both requirements are satisfied. He has never had a rolling programme of repairs, and while some items were carried out because he noticed them, he carried repairs out only at the request of the estate's agents. He had to be chivvied.

"Since notice was served in December 2000 he's had 18 months to remedy this state of affairs. If he couldn't do it in 18 months I find it difficult to see why I should assume he'll do it in the next three years."

Present throughout the two day trial was Roger Dennis, Mr Dennis' older brother.

"I'd say Goliath just won, I think it's a travesty," he said of the case.

"You'll have a cowed population on the Colesbourne Estate now."

Henry Elwes was unavailable for comment.