Two Norfolk councils are at loggerheads over plans to expand a Norfolk hotel. Breckland Council purchased the freehold for Barnham Broom Golf and Country Club last year using £7m of capital reserves.

Two Norfolk councils are at loggerheads over plans to expand a Norfolk hotel.

Breckland Council purchased the freehold for Barnham Broom Golf and Country Club last year using £7m of capital reserves and has pledged £4.5m towards an upgrading programme.

But yesterday it emerged that South Norfolk Council has recommended that plans to expand the hotel should be turned down because protected oak trees would need to be felled.

The hotel has applied to build a new 49-bedroom wing with connecting link corridor and new car park at its site in Honingham Road.

According to a report to South Norfolk councillors, the principle of extending the hotel and associated facilities has been established through the granting of previous permissions, with an extension for 42 new bedrooms, restaurant, kitchen and associated parking approved in 1990 and last renewed in 2005.

But the report says that the new application proposes a 49 bedroom extension in a different location, including an overflow car park outside the existing boundary of the site.

The application proposes the main entrance to the hotel facilities to be via Church Lane, with the current main access off Honingham Road retained to serve the facilities at the south end of the complex.

Both current accesses to the site are poor and have restricted visibility onto what is a fast, straight stretch of country road.

The report says the scheme would involve the felling of two mature oak trees that are the subject of a Tree Preservation Order to provide the necessary visibility splays to the junction of Honingham Road and Church Lane.

The application is recommended for refusal when the council's north-west area planning committee meets on Monday .

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