A sportswear firm’s bid to move into the former home of a mobility store has been rejected by planners over the use of a showroom by its previous tenants.
First XV Ltd, who trade as Rugbystuff.com had applied for a Certificate of Lawfulness to allow them to take over the former Med Ecosse units at Bilston Glen Industrial Estate, in Loanhead.
They claimed the units had been used for storage and distribution by the medical firm for over a decade entitling them to the certificate, which would avoid them having to apply for a change of use.
However planning officers said it was clear from statements and photographs provided that Med Ecosse had run a showroom from the units selling their products from it to customers.
And in a report refusing to grant the certificate they said claims the sales side of the business had been ‘ancillary retail’ did not stand up adding the main use of the units by Med Ecosse was as a Class 1A retail premises rather than storage.
They said: “Med Ecosse operated primarily for the retail sale of goods where the sale, display or service was principally to visiting members of the public. That would be a Class 1A use rather than a Class 6 use.
“That position is reinforced by the details from the Med Ecosse website. It remains online and covers the nature of their business / services when they were still operating from there.
“One might expect a predominant Class 6 storage or distribution use in cases where most product sales transactions are conducted wholly online and thereafter distributed for delivery. However, that was not their business model. There is no evidence on the same website of there having been any online facility for directly buying and ordering any disability products online.
They said: “Given all these considerations, there is no evidence that supports the predominant use of Units 13-16 by Med Ecosse as a Class 6 storage of distribution facility. It is also difficult to see why the described Class 1A (would have been secondary and subordinate to the alleged primary storage and distribution use.”
Med Ecosse operated from the units between 2006 until January this year when they moved out of the premises.
Planners refused to grant the Certificate of lawfulness saying insufficient evidence had been presented to support it being used for storage and distribution over the last 10 years.
By Marie Sharp Local Democracy Reporter
