A row has broken out over plans to open a new Aldi superstore in Whitchurch after bosses at a town furniture store claimed they had an agreement preventing further development at the site.
Staff at CS Contract Furniture, which is based on the Civic Park Industrial Estate and supplies furniture to the Queen at Buckingham Palace, say they were assured by officers at the former North Shropshire District Council that no further retail or residential development would take place in the area when they relocated to the site in 2005.
Company managing director Roger Belham said the relocation from its former Liverpool Road base to make way for new homes cost the firm hundreds of thousands of pounds. Now they fear their business could come under threat if the supermarket is built.
Fresh plans have been submitted by Aldi to build a store at a nearby site at Waymills, and Shropshire Council officials have claimed the principle of development has been approved by the Planning Inspectorate. Government inspectors allowed an appeal by Aldi to build on the site in October after NSDC councillors threw out initial plans early last year.
Mr Belham said Aldi is going to be situated directly at the back of the factory and they hadn’t had any communication from the people who have put in the plans.
“The first we heard was when we got a letter on January 6,” he said. “I got in touch with the local authority to find that the plans had already been approved and that all I could complain about was some of the small details.
“We believe that if we are situated right next to retail properties that there is a potential that people might still not like the noise that we make, that in some way shape or form we may be restrained from operating in our normal way.
“Five years ago we came to an agreement that we would relocate to Civic Park and we had long talks with the North Shropshire District Council to make sure that where we were going to move there would never be an issue with our processes being disturbed or harmed, or our prospects as a business. We were assured that the land was an industrial estate and we would be able to carry on.”
He added the firm had supplied furniture for two of Rick Stein’s restaurants in recent weeks as well as chairs for the Queen’s picture gallery at Buckingham Palace.
Gareth Proffitt, a spokesperson for Shropshire Council, said: “The land is allocated in the local plan for employment uses but this does not prevent retail, providing the applicants have gone through the correct processes of sequential testing and assessing the impact on viability and vitality of the town centre.
“In this instance the planning inspector accepted that these matters had been carried out satisfactorily and that the site is acceptable for retail use.”
CS Contract Furniture was formed in 1982 and employs about 57 people.
By James Pugh and Pam Griffin
