Historic England Says Scrap 291 Homes Beside Hythe’s Royal Military Canal

Historic England has delivered an unusually blunt warning over Planning Application 26/1290/FH for up to 291 homes at the Hythe Imperial Hotel and golf course beside the Royal Military Canal, recommending the “removal of residential to respond to the setting and context of the RMC.”

The hybrid application covers the Hythe Imperial Hotel and Golf Course East and West on Princes Parade. Alongside the housing, it proposes hotel extensions and redevelopment, a spa, public gym and swimming pool, a golf academy and clubhouse, adventure golf, a splash park and substantial landscaping.

But it is the housing proposed on the golf course that has brought the strongest response from the Inspector of Ancient Monuments.

Historic England says the site lies immediately south of an “especially significant section” of the Royal Military Canal, a nationally important Scheduled Monument. It says development of the open ground between the canal and sea threatens land which is “fundamental to understanding and appreciating the monument”, adding:

“We think a residential scheme here would be very harmful and cannot support the proposals in their current form.” 

That puts Historic England and the applicant a considerable distance apart.

Why an empty-looking golf course matters

The significance of the land is easy to miss if the Royal Military Canal is viewed simply as an attractive waterway through Hythe.

It was built as part of Britain’s response to the threat of Napoleonic invasion. Historic England describes it as a 28-mile fortified stop line combining a rampart, water-filled defence and military road.

At this eastern end, the relationship between the canal, the ground south of it and the sea is particularly important. The open land formed part of the defensive landscape: soldiers needed views across the ground towards a possible invading force coming ashore.

Historic England describes the canal as a “unique and well-preserved example” of its type and of “exceptional significance.” It says this stretch is particularly important because the relationship between the canal, the open ground, the sea and other coastal defences can still be understood.

The golf course may be a modern use, but the openness survives.

Historic England describes the area as a “relatively flat, open, uncluttered and undeveloped landscape” and says the site consequently makes a “particularly important contribution” to the significance of the Scheduled Monument.

That is the heart of the dispute.

The applicant reaches a very different conclusion

The applicant’s Environmental Statement sees the same land differently.

Its Cultural Heritage chapter says the golf course now has a modern leisure character and considers the site to make only a “limited, very low contribution” to the significance of the Royal Military Canal because of its openness.

It argues that around half the site would remain landscaped open space and that the proposed landscape design could better reveal aspects of the canal’s historic character.

But the applicant does not say there would be no harm.

Its own assessment concludes that development at the western end would produce “less than substantial” harm at what it calls the “lower end of the spectrum”, resulting in a “Moderate Adverse (Significant)” effect on the Twiss Road Bridge to Seabrook Lodge Bridge section of the Scheduled Monument.

More significantly, the Environmental Statement acknowledges that this effect cannot simply be designed away:

“this impact is unavoidable due to the nature and location of the Proposed Development in relation to the receptor, and there are no feasible mitigation measures which could be implemented to reduce this impact.”

The applicant therefore accepts a significant adverse heritage effect. The argument is about just how serious that effect is.

Historic England says it is much greater.

It considers the residential development would substantially encroach upon the surviving open ground forming the historical and functional context of the canal and make its defensive purpose harder to understand. It says buildings, altered ground levels and new water bodies would add to that harm.

Its conclusion is stark:

“We think that residential development here would cause a very high level of harm.”

Historic England also says the applicant’s supporting information “underestimates the contribution of the open setting of the canal to its significance” and that the resulting harm therefore appears “underplayed.”

That is considerably more than a disagreement about landscaping.

It is a dispute about the starting point of the heritage assessment itself.

The national planning policy changed after the heritage assessment was written

There is another complication.

The applicant’s Cultural Heritage chapter is dated 10 August 2026 and assesses the proposal against the previous 2024 National Planning Policy Framework, including its language of “great weight” and “less than substantial harm.”

The Government published a replacement NPPF on 17 August 2026. It expressly replaces the December 2024 Framework.

That does not, by itself, invalidate the Environmental Statement, but it leaves a central part of its heritage case anchored to superseded national policy wording. FHDC must determine the application against the current Framework.

The new heritage policy is especially relevant here. HE5 says decision-makers should be satisfied that heritage assessments “accurately reflect the effects on heritage assets caused by development proposals.” HE6 requires “substantial weight” to be given to conservation and says ANY HARM to a designated heritage asset is a matter of “considerable importance and weight.”

Scheduled monuments are expressly identified among heritage assets of the highest significance.

That makes the disagreement between Historic England and the applicant difficult to sidestep. One assessment describes the site’s contribution as “very low”; the statutory heritage adviser says it is particularly important and that the harm has been underplayed.

FHDC will have to decide which assessment accurately reflects what would happen to the canal’s significance.

The land is also protected as open space

Historic England raises a separate planning issue: it says the residential site is not allocated for housing and is instead allocated as Open Space.

FHDC’s Places and Policies Local Plan says:

“Existing open spaces, as defined on the Policies Map, will be safeguarded.”

Development involving their loss is subject to specific tests, including whether the open space is surplus, whether equivalent or better provision would replace it, or whether alternative sports or recreational provision clearly outweighs the loss.

The Core Strategy pulls in the same direction on heritage. Policy CSD7 says development in Hythe should respect the town’s historic character and specifically identifies “improving the setting of historic buildings and the Royal Military Canal” as a priority.

Historic England consequently says residential development does not appear to be “in the spirit of an Open Space allocation” or supportive of the relevant Core Strategy priorities.

Its preferred solution is not another landscape buffer or different building materials.

It wants the housing removed.

Then the rules about who decides it change

There is one final twist.

From 31 October 2026, the system deciding which planning applications reach councillors changes across England.

The traditional power allowing ward councillors to require an application to be called before Planning Committee disappears. Government guidance specifically says local arrangements permitting councillor call-ins, or automatic committee referral once a certain number of objections is received, will no longer be possible.

An application of this scale falls into Schedule 2. The new starting point is that it will be determined by planning officers unless it passes the statutory referral gateway.

There are two gateway tests. The application must raise either “an economic, social or environmental issue of significance to the local area”, or “a significant planning matter having regard to the development plan and any other material considerations.”

But residents are not shut out of the process, nor are district councillors or Hythe Town Council and other town or parish councils.

FHDC’s Chief Planning Officer Llywelyn Lloyd told the Audit and Governance Committee on 9 September that ward councillors, any councillor, parish councils and members of the public can make written representations during the consultation period, setting out the planning reasons why an application satisfies the Government’s significance tests and should go before Planning Committee. Those representations will then feed into the gateway assessment. The necessary changes to FHDC’s constitution are due to be considered by Full Council today, ahead of the new national scheme coming into force on 31 October 2026.

That means anyone seeking committee consideration needs to do more than simply say they oppose the development. The planning reasons and the gateway test relied upon need to be set out clearly in writing.

And under the new system, those arguments ultimately have to persuade both gateway decision-makers.

Government guidance says the nominated officer should normally be the Chief Planning Officer and the nominated councillor should normally be the Planning Committee chair. At FHDC, the current Planning and Licensing Committee chair is Cllr Jackie Meade, while Llywelyn Lloyd is Chief Planning Officer – pictured.

 

Residents, councillors and town or parish councils wanting this application considered for referral should therefore ensure their written planning representations are before both Cllr Jackie Meade and Llywelyn Lloyd, as well as being lodged formally with the council’s planning process.

That matters because both the nominated senior planning officer and the nominated councillor must agree to referral.

If they do not agree, the Government guidance is unequivocal: the application must be determined by officers.

So after 31 October, a ward councillor cannot simply call this application in.

The public can still object. Councillors can still object. Town and parish councils can still object. They can argue that Historic England’s intervention, the Scheduled Monument, the Open Space allocation and the development-plan issues satisfy the statutory gateway.

But they will have to make that case in writing — and ultimately convince both people controlling the gateway.

For Planning Application 26/1290/FH, that procedural change arrives just as Historic England has made its own position remarkably clear: if FHDC wants to reduce the harm to the Royal Military Canal, remove the residential development.

The Shepway Vox Team

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