A housebuilder has lost an appeal to build two new houses next door to the home of Tim Davie, the BBC director-general, after he complained that the development would create a “suburban feel” to the village. Davie and his wife Anne lodged their objection to the proposal in December 2023 when a local housebuilder applied for permission to build the houses next door to their multi-million pound farmhouse in the Chilterns. After being refused permission by the local council, the applicants took the plans to the secretary of state, but their appeal has now been dismissed after the design was criticised as “unacceptably harmful”.
Simon Rawle, the planning inspector who carried out the site visit, concluded “that the proposed development would be unacceptably harmful to the character and appearance of the area and would detract from the landscape beauty of this part of the Chilterns National Landscape”..
