A COUPLE with three young children have been given a 12 month stay of execution to remain in their caravan home on their farm.

Emma Roberts and partner Neil Newitt moved their family into a two-unit caravan on land at Llangovan where they are establishing a farm to produce free range meat but have been told they do not have permission to live there.

They had believed they were entitled to live on the site, in the open countryside, while they worked on building a barn and greenhouse for their new farming venture, but planning officers at Monmouthshire County Council told them in October last year the caravan would have to be removed and there was no permission for residential use of the land.

Ms Roberts appealed the enforcement notice to Welsh planning body Planning and Environment Decisions Wales and though it was rejected independent inspector Julie de-Courcey, who considered the appeal, said the six month period the family had been given to leave their land should be extended to 12 months.

Ms Roberts welcomed the extension and the recognition their land Roots Farm, where they have been living in the caravan since August 2025, is being used for agriculture.

Ms Roberts, who has a journalism degree and works in marketing for family businesses in Herefordshire, said she and her partner, a master builder, have had to live on site as they couldn’t afford a mortgage, or rent, on another property while establishing the farming venture on the land they bought with a 40 per cent down payment and mortgage payments of £1,000 a month.

Both had grown up with agricultural backgrounds, with grandparents on both sides farming, and the couple want to establish themselves full time in the industry with the small 25 acre farm where they keep chickens, pigs and a ram.

They intend rearing their own meat and if possibly processing it on site, or as close as possible, and selling it themselves and at events which Ms Roberts said would likely be the only way to make a smaller farm viable rather than the traditional route of selling to market or large suppliers.

Inspector Ms de-Courcey, who visited the farm in July this year, said she had to consider if building or engineering operations were being carried out when the notice was served in October but found “scant persuasive evidence” of what operations have taken place.

Her report said the couple had been given permission for the barn and greenhouse, and a frame for growing vegetables, in May last year. Ms Roberts said they had been unable to start work due to a delay in the council issuing sustainable drainage approval for the development.

In her report, which dismissed the appeal, Ms de-Courcey ruled the family should be given more time to remove the caravan and its cesspool system and find alternative accommodation.

An application for costs, against the council, was also dismissed as the inspector said it hadn’t acted unreasonably in issuing the enforcement notice.