Landowner accused of ‘exploiting’ landslip crisis with £100,000 land demand

Twm Owen, Local Democracy Reporter

A landowner has been accused of exploiting a landslip that has held villagers “hostage” by demanding £100,000 for a football pitch size plot of land.

A council has agreed to pay the sum for a 1.5 acre strip of land, which is slightly larger than a football pitch, beside a landslide that has closed a road to two villages since the end of January.

As a result residents of Llanthony and Capel Y Ffin have faced a 35 mile diversion, over the Gospel Pass, which is one of Wales’ highest roads, with the 70 mile detour in both directions adding up to an hour and half to journeys.

Monmouthshire County Council’s Labour and Green Party cabinet agreed to purchase the land at a special meeting on Monday, March 30 which will first be used to create an immediate diversion that will reopen the Llanthony Valley road at the point of the landslip. The same stretch will then be used to create a longer term access.

But Councillor Ben Callard, the Labour cabinet member responsible for finance, blasted the landowner after being questioned on value for money.

The Llanfoist and Govilon councillor said: “I really feel like this landowner has been, to put it mildly, exploiting a community held hostage by the landslip and costing council taxpayers in Monmouthshire a great deal more than this should have done.

“I spend a lot of my time trying to make sure we get best value all the time and unfortunately during these negotiations our options have been extremely limited.”

Cllr Callard had earlier told the cabinet he had been “personally quite disappointed with the way the landowner has behaved” and said the council’s original “top end value” had been “about £22,000”.

The councillor said the landowner, who he didn’t name, had started talks at a “much higher price” but said thanks were due to council officers who’d driven that down.

He said: “In trying to reach an agreement we’ve been between a rock and a hard place.”

Difficult circumstances

Conservative opposition group leader Richard John said residents would welcome the reopening of the road and acknowledged the “difficult circumstances” but questioned if the council had “secured the best possible value for money” with, he said, average agricultural land sales in Wales at around £8,000 to £9,000 an acre.

The Mitchell Troy and Trellech councillor added: “I share Cllr Callard’s anger at the fact were are in this situation and the behaviour he mentioned.”

Council leader Mary Ann Brocklesby said securing the land “could not wait and had to be done very quickly” and other options could have taken weeks or months and “possibly longer had we gone down the route of a compulsory purchase order.”

The council will soon enter a contract with its preferred contractor, Griffiths, allowing construction work to start on April 7.

The project is expected to be completed by May 15, depending on weather conditions and site constraints, which Cllr Brocklesby said was also important for the coming tourist season.

The cabinet was also told no further land purchase is expected for the longer term solution.