Tunbridge Wells Councillor Wins Retrospective Approval for Pantiles Restaurant's Extended Seating Area

Tunbridge Wells Borough Council's planning committee has granted retrospective permission for an extended outdoor seating area at The Old Fish Market, the Grade II listed restaurant on the Lower Walk of the Pantiles - legalising an extension to the seating that had, by the council's own account, already been in place without permission for roughly five years. The application was referred to the full committee rather than decided by officers for one specific reason: the applicant, Matthew Sankey of Brittany Inns Ltd, is a sitting Tunbridge Wells Borough Councillor.

The Old Fish Market has operated as a restaurant and cafe since 2013, when the council approved a change of use for the building together with an outdoor seating area measuring 6.8 metres wide by 4.8 metres deep from the front of the building. According to the council's own planning committee report, the seating area actually in use on site was around 1.5 metres deeper than that approved footprint - and had been for approximately five years before this year's application was submitted.

Mr Sankey's business initially tried a different route to regularise the extra space: in spring 2025 it applied for a Certificate of Lawful Development, which would have confirmed the extended area was already immune from enforcement simply through the passage of time. According to the council's planning committee report, officers were set to recommend refusing that certificate, because only part of the extended area - not the whole of it - had actually been in unauthorised use for the full ten years required to gain that immunity. The application, reference 25/00361/LDCEX, was withdrawn on 27 May 2025 before it was heard. A fresh application - 25/01460/FULL - was submitted instead, this time asking the council to grant planning permission for the extended seating retrospectively, along with retention of the canopy and parasol structure already on site.

Planning applications of this size are usually decided by council officers under delegated powers. This one was escalated to the full planning committee for a single stated reason, set out plainly in the committee report: "the applicant is a Borough Councillor." The report was considered at the committee's meeting on 17 September 2025, with officers recommending approval.

The Old Fish Market's outdoor seating has a history of its own. A canopy and parasol over the seating area were refused planning and listed building consent in May 2014 and again in March 2015, before an alternative design was granted consent in June 2015. The building itself - as its name suggests, originally a fishmongers, later a tourist information centre - is Grade II listed and sits within the Tunbridge Wells Conservation Area, meaning any change to its setting is weighed against both heritage and conservation-area policy.

The application was far from contentious among residents and visitors. The council received 220 representations: 214 in support, citing the seating's contribution to the character and vitality of the Pantiles and the welcoming space it creates for visitors and surrounding traders, against just six objections. Those objecting raised concerns about noise and disturbance, the impact on the conservation area and listed buildings, the retrospective nature of the application, and the fact that the extended seating narrows the shared walkway between the Upper and Lower Walks.

In recommending approval, officers pointed to several factors: the extension builds on an already-permitted seating area rather than introducing an entirely new use; the character of the wider Pantiles has shifted further toward restaurants, cafes and bars since the original 2013 permission was granted; the canopy and parasol cause only "very limited harm" to the listed building's significance, which is outweighed by the public and heritage benefits of keeping the Pantiles' historic buildings in active use; and the larger seating area does not cause significant harm to neighbouring residential amenity or unduly obstruct the pedestrian walkway. The committee granted permission on 17 September 2025, subject to six conditions covering the approved plans, the hours the extended seating can be used, how the seating area is sited and enclosed, restrictions on the canopy and parasol, and a requirement that a 2.5-metre gap be kept clear between the north-west edge of the seating and a retaining wall on the site.

The case is a reminder that even small-scale, everyday planning matters on the Pantiles - a seating area, a parasol - sit within a protected historic setting where every change is scrutinised, and that the council's own process builds in an extra layer of transparency when the applicant is one of its own elected members. Sources: Tunbridge Wells Borough Council Planning Committee report, 25/01460/FULL and council's condition summary confirming the decision