A CONTROVERSIAL plan for a huge crematorium in north Cornwall – hated by hundreds of local residents – has finally been refused by Cornwall Council three months after the High Court quashed an original decision by the local authority to approve it.

Gemma Watton, one of two residents who legally challenged the council’s decision to allow the proposed Atlantic View Crematorium next to the A39 at Poundstock, near Bude, said of the planning department’s notice to refuse the returned application: “It basically says exactly what we have all been trying to tell Cornwall Council for the last five years.

“It really should not have taken so long, consumed so many people’s lives and cost so much financially and emotionally to get Cornwall Council see what was abundantly obvious to lay people many years ago.”

What would have been one of the largest crematoria in the UK on a 5.8-hectare rural site was approved by Cornwall Council in November 2022 despite hundreds of objections from local residents.

After councillors voted to approve the proposal there were disappointed jeers from the public gallery at New County Hall / Lys Kernow in Truro with one objector, Colin Cleave, shouting “shambles, you do not know what you are doing”.

The new crematorium had been proposed on the basis of providing a facility for people in North Cornwall and Devon who had to travel long distances to Bodmin or Barnstaple to access their nearest crematorium. Applicant the Atlantic View Crematorium Consortium said that the Bodmin facility was operating at 130 per cent capacity as of 2019 and families were having to wait more than three weeks for services. They said that the demand was only expected to increase and that there was a need for a crematorium to serve people in North Cornwall.

However, objectors questioned the viability of the project and said that it was in the wrong location. They claimed that it could have a major impact on residents and on the tourism industry in the area. Ms Watton and another resident Jonathan Cameron challenged the council’s decision to allow the crematorium and following a judicial review at the High Court in London in October last year, judge Sir Duncan Ouseley found in their favour and quashed the permission.

He found that the planning officer’s report gave a seriously misleading overall impression of the evidence concerning the project’s viability. The risk that the crematorium might not be fully used needed to be spelled out.

The judge also found that the planning officer’s report in respect of the transport benefits of the plan was significantly misleading and expressed no clear conclusion as to whether the proposal complied with certain landscape and environmental protection policies.

Following the judicial review, the applicant submitted revised plans which sought to reduce internal floor space and address some of the concerns raised during the court case regarding the size and capacity of the proposed crematorium.

However, the revised plans were not accepted by Cornwall Council’s planning department on the basis that they would generate a requirement for re-consultation with the public and consultees. Therefore, the application was assessed on the original plans. There are currently over 450 public comments concerning the proposals on the council’s planning portal, the vast majority of which are against.

The council has now refused the application on the grounds it “has not been demonstrated to a satisfactory extent that there is an overriding locational and business need for the proposed crematorium to be sited in that location, which is not accessible to a range of sustainable modes of transport and fails to prioritise walking and cycling over the use of private fossil fuel vehicles.

“Furthermore, the proposed development will result in a significant change and an intensification of land use on what is currently a green field site, introducing new built form in undeveloped countryside.”

Planning officers with delegated powers also decided the proposal fails to comply with habitat directives in that there is no overriding public interest for the proposal and there would be a disturbance to foraging and commuting bats.