A chef and waitress of a Perthshire hotel and restaurant have been forced to live in a caravan due to a lack of affordable housing.
Restaurant owners Geoff and Josie Wilson applied for the caravan to remain on the grounds of Inn On The Tay in Grandtully, near Aberfeldy, until March next year.
Two members of staff from New Zealand had been living in the two-bedroom static accommodation next to the Tay since February as an emergency measure.
“Urgent accommodation was required as a landlord gave backword on vital staff members accommodation,” the restaurant’s application form said.
Perth and Kinross Council gave temporary planning permission despite a neighbour objection.
Caravan at Inn on the Tay a ‘knee-jerk reaction’
Mr Wilson explained that installing the static caravan was a “knee-jerk reaction”.
A property they had organised for the two members of staff had fallen through so they had to act fast.
“We thought we had a property secure but it wasn’t available,” he said.
“Money needed to be spent to bring the cottage up to standards.
“We felt they didn’t want to do that, so we ran out of time.”
The restaurant previously housed residents in a five-bedroom property in Grandtully but this stopped due to a lack of foreign staff during and after the Covid restrictions.
“So in the village our options were very limited,” Mr Wilson added.
Grandtully restaurant ‘thinking outside the box’
In March the couple will celebrate their 17th anniversary at the Inn.
They say that finding staff at the moment is as difficult as ever.
“The entire valley is so attractive for people to visit and there’s a lack of infrastructure to accommodate people to work in the tourist industry,” Mr Wilson said.
Help might eventually be at hand in the form of a recently-formed community group.
Aberfeldy Development Trust hopes to build new homes to address the high cost of housing in the area.
But Mr Wilson says the current situation requires inventiveness.
“If you are lucky enough to find staff there is definitely a lack of accommodation as well.
“You have to think outside the box which, in our case, was a static caravan.”
Council grants temporary permission
The retrospective planning application received an objection from a resident who argued the caravan “goes against everything that a conservation area stands for.”
Their objection letter said: “The site is prominent, highly visible from the main Aberfeldy to Ballinluig Road, the road from Grandtully to Strathtay village and also is clearly visible from the river and river walkway.”
But the council granted planning permission on condition that the caravan’s residents are employed by the restaurant, and that the accommodation is removed by March 31 2024.
According to the decision report: “This is to protect the character of the countryside, the visual amenity of the area and nature conservation interests.”
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