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A British retired couple living in Spain are embarking on a landmark legal action over their illegally demolished property.
Lee and Helen Prior, both 68 have had their Spanish demolished in 2008 over ‘planning irregularities’ in the first such action in Spain. Despite having adequate planning permission the regional government in Andalusia declared it invalid and ordered the demolition.
Even though the Spanish Constitutional Court ruled that the demolition was illegal this proved to be an hollow victory. Now the couple are pursuing the Spanish judiciary itself.
"We thought this would be a place that our children and grandchildren would spend their holidays, where we could spend a really lovely retirement after working hard all our lives
"For three years that's exactly how it was, idyllic."
“It’s our last hope but we’ve been warned it would be a ground-breaking case,” Helen Prior told The Telegraph.
“The Spanish authorities hope that we will give up and just go home. But this is our home. We have nowhere else to go to.
“I do wonder how many years I have left to live and it’s so upsetting to think that they will probably be spent fighting on. But we won’t give up. We can’t.”
The entire expat community in Spain and beyond will be paying close attention to the case.
