A BUILDER of three new mews homes behind the old Ship Inn in Mantle Street, Wellington, has been told to demolish two of them.

Roger Bird turned the pub into two houses and knocked down a two-storey function room and single-storey skittle alley to build the houses.

But members of Taunton Deane Borough Council’s planning committee decided that two of the properties unacceptably overlooked a neighbour’s garden and asked for an enforcement notice ordering the demolition of the homes within 12 months.

The decision came after Mr Bird made two retrospective planning applications for the three properties to keep them as they had been built but with obscured glazing installed in first floor windows.

The planning officer felt obscured glazing would reduce concerns about overlooking neighbours and recommended the plans should be approved.