A STABLE owner who erected a six-foot fence to "keep vandals out and livestock in" has been told to tear it down.

Carol Richards, of Rock Mount in Pimlico Road, Clitheroe, told Ribble Valley Council's planning committee that she had experienced severe trouble with vandals.

"Youngsters are drinking and smoking on my land. My horses could escape over the wall to a 20 foot drop on the other side.

"I have gone to a lot of trouble to put up this fence.

"It is a nice Victorian-style fence. I didn't realise that I needed permission to erect it. I just want to keep vandals out and my livestock in," she said. But council officers told the meeting that the fence dominated the landscape and was a "jarring element" in the street.

It was six foot high, 28 metres in length and in an elevated position above the road.

"I do not consider that the need for security overrides the visual impact of the fence," planning officer John Macholc told the meeting.

The proposal, if approved, would set a "dangerous precedent for similar unsightly developments to the further detriment of the visual amenity," he said.

Council leader Howel Jones's proposal that the application be refused and enforcement action taken was supported by committee members.

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