A BURTON BRADSTOCK businessman is claiming refusal to allow him to park cars on his land will threaten the future of his business.

Sajiv Vij, director of Burton Bradstock Cars, has been turned down by West Dorset District Council planning department in his bid to get a certificate of lawfulness granted for his plot of land opposite the garage at the Old Smithy.

Mr Vij said he wants to use the area for his employees' parking.

He said: "We have been here 17 years. I bought it last year and started using it then without any problems for months. Then someone contacted the council and we got a letter saying it was not a lawful use so we stopped using it.

"The bottom line is that it always used to belong to the garage before we bought it and they used to use it.

"All we wanted to do is take it back to how it used to be and start using it again.

"We need to use it because the business is growing and we need extra space or we will be forced to relocate out of the area."

His application was refused because the land has not been continually used for the purpose of storing cars for the requisite ten years.

Mr Vij said the district council was just following the letter of the law. He added that two long-standing villagers, Roger Saint and Basil Dent, had signed affidavits at solicitors to say it had commercial use.

The parish council opposed the lawfulness application after discussing it at their May meeting and councillors said there felt there was no history of garage activities on the site. "Current parking on the site and on the footpath was a danger and a possible fire hazard," they say.