David 2, Goliath 0...

News reaches us that as a result of the Planning Inquiry held in March this year, the Planning Inspectorate has decided to reject the Vineyard Farms appeal against the decision made by Medway Council's Planning Committee in March 2022, to turn down the vainglorious plans for a monstrous Lord Foster monument and vinicultural theme park centre for the green belt area of outstanding natural beauty (AONB) that is Upper Bush.

The full text of the appeal decision can be found here.

However, I would be very surprised if this is the end of it. 

Vineyard Farms have very deep pockets (or at least, their billionaire owner does) and an unquenchable hubris. Their only legal recourse in the face of this latest rejection of their plans will be an appeal to the High Court. The basis of such an appeal will need to be that the Planning Inspector has "erred in law": his decision cannot be directly challenged, but the process by which it was reached can be. If successful, the appeal will have to be reheard by a different inspector, avoiding the legal error made by their predecessor. 

The Vineyard Farms team were not at all impressed with the inspector's decision to widen the scope of the inquiry to include Green Belt issues, something which they and their supporters at Medway Council had wanted to avoid. On the opening day of the inquiry, there were dark mutterings about that from the Vineyard Farms army of consultants, lawyers and advisors, something that could have won them very few brownie points from the inspector himself.

It is interesting to note that in his decision, Green Belt issues were not considered to be a reason for the rejection of the VF appeal. This, in effect, is a big win for them. It means that the rather ludicrous "Millington precedent" (which in law means that VF's vainglorious massive tourist centre and luxury restaurant can be regarded as an "agricultural building") has been upheld, despite the huge scale of the development.

It will be interesting to see how Vineyard Farms respond in the face of this latest (albeit temporary) setback.

We know they aren't good losers. They have already threatened to build a series of ugly sheds right next to Bush Road, and to bring lots of additional service traffic down Bush Road instead of across their fields if they don't get their winery (see the latter part of this post). They have also threatened to take all of their agricultural wastes out by truck (rather than composting it, like any other farm would) adding to Bush Road traffic. 

The VF "sheds" proposed for Bush Road (picture from VF's "Proof of Evidence" appendices)...

The sheds (that could be built under "permitted development") don't need to be so ugly, nor do they need to be right by Bush Road. And why would they need to operate a shed any differently to the way they would their winery? 

A cynic would say that it really does smack of wanting to punish the local community for having the temerity to fight them - and win. One would hope that Medway's Planning department would moderate all this in any way it could, but they have been overwhelmingly supportive of Vineyard Farms in the past and somehow I cannot see their adulatory stance changing. 

No-one would deny that having planted so many vines in such a hurry, VF now have a pressing (no pun intended) need for manufacturing capacity to process the output - but perhaps a less cocksure company wouldn't have put all of their eggs in a £30m Lord Foster basket upon the presumption that everyone would just bow down to their grandiose plans for Upper Bush. The "ticking clock" is of their own horological design.

So if I was Mr. Mark Dixon (the billionaire owner of Vineyard Farms), I think I'd now be asking a few pointed questions about the approach of my UK management team. 

All they have managed to deliver so far are massive invoices for the army of consultants and lawyers they've employed, all to no avail. They have tried steamrollering the local community twice and both times they have got their arses kicked. What comes across to us locals as a high-handed, dismissive approach clearly isn't working for them.

The Planning Inspector has left the door open for them. He hasn't rejected the basic premise of the winery as "an agricultural building", only the premise that the impact and scale of the original proposal is appropriate for its AONB surroundings. In effect, the planning inspector's ruling has given Vineyard Farms a blueprint: it tells them how they need to tweak their design to get it built in the AONB.  Something else to consider is that Medway Council are also broke: I don't see them having either the resources or the will to contest any further appeals should VF submit revised plans, which are therefore likely to be just waived through as a result. 

It's clear that many of the local Cuxton community don't want the massive Foster flying saucer, for many of the same reasons that the Planning Inspectorate has rejected it. If only Vineyard Farms could swallow their pride...

Contrary to the spiteful and rather nasty closing remarks made by the Vineyard Farms representatives at the public inquiry, the opponents of the Foster-designed winery aren't all short-sighted, unimaginative NIMBYs with a hatred of change. Most of them would actually still like to see Vineyard Farms succeed as a business. But not at any cost.   

An advertising slogan for their "Harlot" brand: the Vineyard Farms philosophy for everything...?

Maybe VF could scale back their grandiose plans and still get a lot of what they need (as against everything they want) without pissing off the locals. Maybe they could do their manufacturing and bottling off-site (thereby solving a lot of the traffic concerns) but still have a scaled-down tourist centre and wine press nearby that satisfied the AONB appearance concerns and didn't involve such massive upheaval. Maybe they don't need all of the glamping tents, petting zoos and second/third/fourth phase tourist development plans that they so obviously aspire to. 

Maybe they could try being friendly, communicative, supportive and honest with the local Cuxton community (and especially their long-suffering neighbours at Upper Bush) and look to build a winery that was first and foremost a local asset with local involvement and local support, and then see how it went from there. 

I'm not holding my breath on that lot, however. I can't see Vineyard Farms changing their style or their aspirations somehow, unless the management team changes.   

So will Mr Sasha White KC (the formidable top brief who headed up the VF appeal team) wind up representing Vineyard Farms at a High Court appeal? I certainly can't see Vineyard Farms backing off or backing down. Ever. 

We shall see. They have six weeks to lodge an appeal.