Housing plans are back on track

The Highways Agency is in advanced talks with an unnamed housing developer to sell off the Sea Stores Site, off Kennedy Way, for 250 homes.

Negotiations over the sale of the site resumed after Richard Newman, son of well-known Yate engineer Hedley Newman, was told he had no claim to the land.

Mr Newman had laid a claim to a third of the land when the Highways Agency proposed selling it off last year.

The site was gained during the Second World War through a compulsory purchase order by the government from Sodbury Vale District, the Newman family and Bristol Land and Mineral Company.

But the Highways Agency has decided Mr Newman has no claim to the land because it has changed since it was purchased.

South Gloucestershire Council and relatives of Bristol Land and Mineral Company decided not to follow up their claim for the land.

Mr Newman told the Gazette last October he was keen to move back to the town where he once brought up.

He said: "I'm obviously very disappointed for me and the people of Yate. The government would not entertain our claim and our chance has gone to regain land in Yate for my family.

"It never welcomed my claim to the land, they always wanted to do business with someone else.

"I would take the issue to a judicial review but I do not have the time or money."

The land was owned by Mr Newman's business Newman Industries Ltd, which had employed more than 3,000 people in the area.

Highways Agency spokesman Robin Miller said: "The Highways Agency is currently in negotiations with a bidder for the land.

"South Gloucestershire Council had investigated claiming part of the land but decided not to go ahead with it, while Mr Newman's claim was turned down by our legal advisers because the land had changed since it was bought from the family."

A South Gloucestershire Council spokeswoman said: "The council have no interest in the site which would have to be purchased at residential value."