THE proprietor of a Badshot Lea antiques enterprise is fighting for her business, in the latest of a decade of battles against Waverley Borough Council. An enforcement notice giving Hilary Burroughs six months to close down the Antiques Warehouse at Badshot Lea Farm has been served, over a year after she was warned to expect it. Mrs Burroughs, who renovated two ramshackle Elizabethan barns at the farm and set up shop 12 years ago, providing space for numerous small tradespeople to display their wares, has appealed against the notice, which gave her six months to get out. When she began renting the barns, they had been used for light industry including car repairs, and this is the use Waverley says they should return to. A report on the matter will go to Waverley's planning committee at the end of November, when councillors must decide whether to continue the action. A new dimension to the council's argument that the use is inappropriate in the strategic gap between Farnham and Aldershot emerged last week, when councillors gave the nod to a large commercial leisure centre and the relocation of Farnham Rugby Club - also in the gap. Mrs Burroughs attended the council meeting to hear the debate on the issue. "I was astounded to hear that all the planning rules and guidelines for this strategic gap were to be swept aside - the very same rules and guidelines that are being used with such alacrity to close my business down," she observed. She claimed that the precise mitigating factors applied to the rugby club - about enriching people's lives and a fruitless 10-year search for alternative accommodation - apply equally to the Antiques Warehouse. "The planners seem to have filled up their own precious strategic gap themselves, while closing down the smallest, quietest, most environmental business in the whole area. How perverse is that?" The only difference, she claimed, was that her business is not in the position to provide the "beguiling financial package" offered to Waverley by the Stax leisure company. David Attfield, Farnham town councillor for Badshot Lea, also finds the situation iniquitous and says he will be supporting Mrs Burroughs' case if it goes to appeal. "I personally know of no one in the village who objects to her being there," said Mr Attfield. "I think she is being victimised by Waverley." He said objections on traffic grounds were simply not valid, especially bearing in mind the traffic generated by the nearby Badshot Lea Garden Centre and Sainsbury's. He accused the council of inconsistency, opening the floodgates to development by allowing the rugby club application while stamping on small concerns like the small plant sales business they closed down in Monkton Lane. "Someone like Hilary that has been there for 12 years isn't doing anybody any harm and they seem hell-bent on destroying her business." John Anderson, Waverley development and control manager, explained: "The current position is that Mrs Burroughs was granted a temporary permission to continue using the building as a shop until November 30, 2002. "Ever since then, she has been operating without planning permission. It isn't a location where we would normally grant a shop use," he pointed out. Mrs Burroughs has already lost one appeal (in 1998) against Waverley enforcement action, but following that councillors agreed to grant a temporary four-year permission. According to Mr Anderson, the decision to take action now is driven by the possibility that she could acquire rights to stay. "If the planning authority doesn't take action within 10 years, it becomes a lawful use and it would become a lawful use for anyone to run any shop and from a planning authority's point of view, we don't want that to happen." The council's interest was not in stopping Mrs Burroughs, but in stopping anyone else who could operate a shop on the site without restrictions on such matters as hours of operation, parking and deliveries, he said. Mrs Burroughs, however, pointed out the irony that if she hadn't been granted a temporary permission in 1998, by now she would have the legal right to stay. "The contorted logic leading to this enforcement action means that had we been operating at The Antiques Warehouse illegally for the 12 years that we have been there, we would have been awarded a certificate of lawfulness to enable us to legally continue. "What bureaucratic nonsense and a monumental waste of public (and personal) funds!" She continued: "I defy anyone to provide evidence to support the allegations that we 'compromise the character of the area and the amenities of the neighbour'. "Anyone with a modicum of intelligence knows that we enhance and create, rather than detract from the character of the area, surrounded as we are by the land infill site, gravel pits, motorway, giant garden centre/department store, and Sainsbury's." Mrs Burroughs added: "The planners would like to see us 'in a location which is more accessible by non-car modes of transport', presumably so that customers can take their wardrobes home strapped to their backs. "One would be hard-pressed to find a functioning and viable antiques centre that can't be accessed by car." She described the operation as very quiet and low key, with cars entering the car park at the rate of 1.5 per hour - "would that it were more!". "There is no talk of closing down The Packhouse antique centre, four times the size of The Antiques Warehouse, a stone's throw from us, with their constantly full car park of 60 cars per day. Why?" she asked. "Nobody from the enforcement team had bothered to check the facts before issuing the new orders with such alacrity, so keen must they have been to enhance their enforcement graph. "I do see that these new enforcement officers, paid for with a huge new grant to the WBC, are keen to justify their existence, but I feel their powers are becoming a tad draconian and bullying. "I doubt they bullied Sainsbury's and the Badshot Lea Garden Centre, enormous retail businesses in the same strategic gap." She suggested the reasons that the planners had put forward for closure were "as entirely erroneous and without foundation as they were 10 years ago". This time, she added, "with our long, perfect track record", she hoped they would not be believed by a government inspector.