A sprawling traveller site built on protected green belt in a lightning-fast weekend ‘land grab’ must be demolished – with families handed four months to leave.
The fields near Romford, Essex, had been untouched until council officials prepared to clock off on Friday, November 28 last year.
Barely two-and-a-half hours later, the once peaceful grassland in Noak Hill had been transformed into a vast construction site.
Eight diggers were tearing across the pasture beneath blazing floodlights as teams of workers carried out a huge earth-moving operation.
By Saturday morning, convoys of eight-wheel lorries were blocking surrounding roads as they queued to deliver huge quantities of hardcore and other building materials.
Within hours, the countryside was being carved into residential plots and smothered with hardstanding.
Fences and concrete posts were erected, electricity and lighting installed and connections prepared for gas, drainage and water.
The entire operation was intended to have the caravan site ready for occupation before Havering Council could secure stop notices or court injunctions.
The site near Romford in Essex was built illegally by travellers within hours of council staff leaving for the weekend
Planning inspector Grahame Kean described the extraordinary project as a ‘disciplined rapid unauthorised development’
Full details of the ‘carefully planned operation’ were laid bare this month in an appeal against enforcement action ordering traveller families to leave the land.
Planning inspector Grahame Kean described the extraordinary project as a ‘disciplined rapid unauthorised development’ intended to confront council staff with effectively a ‘done deal’ when they returned to work on the Monday.
He said: ‘The development was clearly intended to be ready for occupation by the end of the weekend in question and presented a fait accompli for the council.’
The tactic of building at speed after council offices have closed and then seeking permission retrospectively has become increasingly familiar to planning enforcement teams – and highlighted a number of times by the Daily Mail.
Over the Easter weekend, diggers and caravans moved on to green belt land near Flamstead, Hertfordshire, while other unauthorised sites prompted legal action in Surrey and Kent.
During the May bank holiday, workers descended on countryside in Essex and Kent after local authority offices closed for the long weekend.
At Willows Green, near Felsted, Essex, work began within hours of Uttlesford District Council closing.
Although the circumstances differ between sites, the planning tactic is broadly the same: build quickly, move caravans on and then seek retrospective permission after the landscape has already been altered.
At Noak Hill, the inspector found that the development had been ‘long in the planning’ and that retrospective planning applications to lawfully use the land were submitted ‘almost as an afterthought’.
The land was bought by a company called High Top Roofs and Gutters Limited in May 2025 and then later subdivided among several Irish Traveller families.
Frank Mongan, whose family roots are from Galway, acquired one parcel of 14 pitches. Thomas Mongan took another plot of land, while the third parcel was sold to James and Joseph McDonagh.
The site is situated just outside London’s urban sprawl (pictured in a drone photo)
A large queue of trucks arriving at the site on November 28 last year
Four days after the weekend operation began, Havering Council issued enforcement and stop notices to halt work.
Ray Morgon, the leader of Havering Council, said at the time that the authority was ‘disappointed and shocked’ that work had begun without planning permission, particularly because the field was protected green belt.
He said on December 2 last year: ‘The council has a court injunction for unlawful encampments on Havering land, but this does not apply to this site. We will look at cleaning up any mess on our roads.
‘The council’s planning enforcement team is currently carrying out an investigation and once we’ve looked into the matter we can then decide how best to respond.
‘It is very likely that a planning enforcement notice and stop notice will be served.’
But the orders, which were served in the presence of Metropolitan Police officers, failed to halt the development.
When the Planning Inspectorate visited the former paddock in May, he found that it had been ‘unlawfully and deliberately’ transformed beyond recognition.
Traveller families had constructed 29 separate pitches containing static vans and tourers, including several with ‘large metal decorative entrance gates’, and surrounded ‘comprehensively by hardstanding throughout the developed area of the site’.
Mr Kean added: ‘Although it seems that some people have taken up residence, the site is very much a development that is still in progress.
‘There are significant hazards on site, common access areas included large mounds of earth waiting to be removed or redistributed, uneven surfaces, general rubble and detritus in several areas, pooling of water in sunken areas of hardstanding, and pipework and loose cables sticking out of the ground.’
Havering Council later rejected two applications seeking permission to retain the land as a traveller site.
The Planning Inspectorate has now dismissed appeals against the council’s enforcement notices and ordered the compound to be removed.
A plan of the unauthorised site in a council planning document
Those responsible have been given four months to dismantle the development and restore the green belt.
Mr Kean concluded: ‘The scale of the unauthorised development is considerable and in stark contrast to the pre-existing condition of the site.
‘The development causes substantial harm to the openness of the green belt.’
The inspector said the field had previously been open countryside used for grazing, with public footpaths running through and around the area.
The site was initially bought by a man called Jack Thursting through a company that he controls, High Top Roofs and Gutters Limited, on May 2, 2025.
Although it lies close to Harold Hill and the edge of London’s urban sprawl, it forms part of the green belt separating the capital from built-up areas in Essex.
Council officials also warned that the land could have provided habitat for protected species, including great crested newts.
Because the field was excavated and covered at such speed, no full ecological survey could be carried out before the damage was done.
‘The evidence before me suggests that it is possible that the unauthorised development could have had a significant impact on protected species or their supporting habitat,’ Mr Kean said.
The removal of grassland and installation of hardstanding had also damaged the landscape, including trees and hedgerows.
Government policy requires planning inspectors to treat intentional unauthorised development as an important consideration.
The measure was introduced to discourage developers from building first and applying for permission afterwards.
Mr Kean said the Noak Hill case illustrated ‘precisely’ the conduct the policy was intended to address.
‘The appellants only sought to obtain planning permission at the last moment after most of the planning and implementation of the works had been carried out.
‘The works were committed in a co-ordinated way and flagrantly, timed over a weekend, and continued despite refusal of the applications and service of a stop notice.’
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