THE GOVERNMENT will decide whether The Plough in Winchmore Hill – famous as actress Barbara Windsor’s real life pub before she became landlady of a TV fictional one – can be converted into a mansion. A planning inquiry is being held in the next few weeks.
The pub has been closed since November 2023 and on the market since January last year. Its owners, the Wellington Pub Company, say no-one is seriously interested in buying it as a going concern.
That’s a claim strenuously contested by Penn parish councillors who say that the company’s attempts to sell the pub as a commercial concern have been, at best, half-hearted.
“Some enquiries have gone unanswered and offers made have been rejected,” said Penn parish council chairman Mike West.
There’s concern the developers are trying to rush the plan through before new laws are introduced which will make it harder for pubs to be converted into housing.
It’s not the first time attempts have been made to change the 200 year old pub into residential. In 2003 an attempt to convert it into flats was quickly dropped after a strong campaign by local people, supported by the local council at the time.
This time round Buckinghamshire Council was so slow in reacting it ran out of time in which to make up its mind. Consequently the developer was able to by-pass the council and go straight to the Government for a decision.
In addition, because of the council’s ludicrous planning censorship policy, the views of the public are not known and are not being published.
In a further restriction on the democratic process, the public has only been given from 6 August to 4 September – right in the middle of the holiday period – to send its views to the Planning Inspectorate who are responsible for the planning inquiry. A possible extension is being considered to 18 September.
The plan involves converting the pub into a substantial five bedroom home – with each bedroom having attached dressing rooms – and adding an extension.
It was a thriving business when the late Dame Barbara Windsor and her partner at the time Steve Hollings took over in 1985, with Mr Hollings acting as chef. The couple married a year later and for a time Barbara threw herself into attending local charity events, including the Penn and Tylers Green Fun Run.
But country life was not really her forte and when she and Mr Hollings divorced in 1995 she was already back in London. Her real-life pub experience helped though – in 1994, as Peggy Mitchell, she took over as landlady of the Queen Vic in EastEnders, a role she relished for 16 years.
*You can comment to the Planning Inspector on this link https://appeal-planning-decision.service.gov.uk/comment-planning-appeal/appeals/6013568 although comments received after 4 September may be ruled inadmissible.
Music festival to return three years after the collapse of Penn Fest
A NEW music festival is planned for next spring at the same venue as the collapsed Penn Festival.
Meadow Fest, organised by a company called Stage Crash Events, will be held at the Big Park on the Penn House Estate in Penn Street over the Spring Bank Holiday weekend in May.
On its website, https://www.meadow-fest.com, the company says it will put “music and family at the centre of everything” and its food and drink will be supplied by local operators. It has yet to announce the line-up.
The venue is the same as the popular Penn Festival, or PennFest, which ran for 12 years before it ceased three years ago after the organisers ran into financial difficulties. The organising company later went into administration. The event had attracted star names including Noel Gallagher and Craig David.
Local news
TV appearance -Some of Mark Lane’s Tai Chi group, which meets at Tylers Green Village Hall, were filmed by a BBC TV crew last month for an item on the benefits of Tai Chi for older age-groups. Mark, of The Chase, Tylers Green, is a former British powerlifting champion and world record holder who went on to be a fitness coach.
New resident – TV and radio star Vernon Kay is expected to move into the village this month after his amicable split from his equally famous wife Tess Daly. Since their announcement the couple have stayed together at their home in Fulmer but a new billet in Church Road means he can be within comfortable distance of his former home and current job.
School targeted – Parents and residents have raised over £4,000 to help Manor Farm Infants School in Rose Avenue replace equipment after yobs broke into the Parent/Teacher Association storage huts for three weekends in succession leaving a trail of destruction. The school’s Friends Group has set up a Gofundme page on https://www.gofundme.com/f/help-restore-our-schools-after-repeated-vandalism?attribution Police have not reported on whether the culprits have been caught.
Terrorists plea – Three terrorists who hid bomb making equipment in King’s Wood, Tylers Green are appealing to be released from prison early. Ibrahim Savant, Arafat Khan and Waheed Zaman were each sentenced to 20 years in 2010 for their part in a terrorist plot to blow up commercial airliners. They are now appealing for parole. One of the ringleaders, Assad Sarwar of Totteridge was sentenced to a minimum of 36 years and is not appealing for parole.
Pub wants to expand – The Royal Standard of England in Forty Green is having another go at extending at the back of the pub after an earlier attempt was rejected by a planning inspector because he felt it would be out of character with the rest of the building. Penn Parish Council has again objected but the views of members of the public are not being published because of Buckinghamshire Council’s planning censorship policy.
Falklands visit – Penn’s MP Sarah Green (Lib-Dem Chesham and Amersham), pictured above, visited the Falkland Islands last month as part of a cross-party fact-finding visit by backbench MPs to talk to military personnel and islanders.
Mansion row – Penn parish councillors say they have “strong concerns” about new plans to replace the 1930s mansion Penbury Woods in Witheridge Lane, Penn. An initial scheme five years ago to replace it with arts and crafts style mansion has been changed, they say. They are concerned the new design will cause light pollution in surrounding woodland.
Ashwells start – Work on preparing the ground to build a new estate of 109 homes on Ashwell Fields, adjacent to Ashwells and Cock Lane, Tylers Green, begins this month. Parish councillors have suggested that the street names on the estate, as well as the nearby Gomm Valley development, should be based on the names of World War II fallen inscribed on the Tylers Green and Loudwater war memorials.
Phew! – Penn and Tylers Green enjoyed/endured its hottest summer on record and one of the driest. Apart from a couple of brief drizzle spells, it didn’t rain from 6 June – Fun Run Day – until 20 August – 71 days – and there were at least 10 days when temperatures topped 30 degrees centigrade. Widmer Pond on the common had to be regularly replenished so the fish did not perish. Harvest yields on local farms were said to be down 30 per cent on average.
Field fire – Eight fire fighting crews subdued a fire which engulfed a large field of grass and shrubs off Gravelly Way, Penn Bottom on 25 August. The fire damaged an area equivalent to nearly four football pitches and the road was closed for several hours. Some adjoining woodland and a farm outbuilding were also damaged.
Golden anniversary – Our nearest library – Hazlemere – celebrates 50 years since it first opened this month,
Tidy prize – Seer Green was judged best overall in this year’s Buckinghamshire Best Kept Village competition. Beaconsfield won the award for the small towns section.
Farewell Pauline – Pauline Stowe, whose late husband Nigel was vicar of Penn Street and officiated in Penn and Tylers Green for nearly 40 years, has died aged 92.
Wembley? Not this year – Despite an earlier impressive 3 – 0 win at Beaconsfield Town in the extra preliminary round of the Emirates FA Cup, Penn and Tylers Green men’s first team went down 2-1 away to Ascot Town in the first preliminary round proper. Neighbours Flackwell Heath made it through though, beating Hallen 3-0. Just 12 more rounds to go before the Wembley final.
Growing attraction – Penn and Tylers Green Village Show attracted 27 new entrants this year and raised £580 to help Wycombe’s homeless people. Next year’s show in the village hall will be on 11 September.
Trunk road – Luckily no pedestrians or vehicles were passing when this tree collapsed without warning opposite the Lion of Beaconsfield pub, completely blocking the main Penn to Beaconsfield road. It gave a few squirrels a jolt though.
Our GP surgeries earn high praise, but MP warns thousands of new homes will put them under pressure
BOTH MAIN GP surgeries serving Penn and Tylers Green received high praise in the latest annual survey of patients conducted by the NHS.
But Penn MP Sarah Green (Lib Dem, Chesham and Amersham) said the surgeries are feeling the strain and the pressure will increase as hundreds of new homes in their catchment area are completed in the next few years.
The NHS survey found that 86 per cent of patients at Highfield Surgery in Highfield Way said their overall experience of dealing with the practice was good. At the Simpson Centre, which includes Penn Surgery, the figure was 85 per cent. The national average for patient satisfaction was 77 per cent.
Ms Green has been in talks with Housing Minister Matthew Pennycook on whether local services such as doctor’s surgeries will be able to cope with the influx of new populations once major housing developments in Tylers Green, Hazlemere and Beaconsfield are completed in the next few years.
She hasn’t revealed the outcome of those talks but said that in the past ten years GP surgeries in Buckinghamshire have seen an average increase of more than a thousand new homes in their catchment areas.
This is bound to increase in the next ten years. At present Highfield deals with 7,100 patients while the Simpson Centre’s two surgeries at Beaconsfield and Penn have 18,700 patients on their books.
As part of the agreement to eventually build 544 homes in the Gomm Valley, between Hammersley Lane and Cock Lane, Tylers Green, the developer Taylor Wimpey has agreed to contribute to an expansion of surgeries serving the area, including Penn Surgery. Earlier this year the surgery opened two new clinic rooms on the first floor of its building in Elm Road, Penn, but more is likely to be needed.
At Highfield a patient participation group has been formed and there are plans to set up a prostate cancer support group.
How Penn and Tylers Green fought – and won – the battle to save our last remaining butcher. But now it’s time to say goodbye
THERE WAS a fitting village send-off for our last remaining butcher Joe Gleeson and his family last month with a few drinks in the Red Lion.
It included customers and friends (in Joe’s opinion they are both the same), plus loads of gifts and goodwill messages wishing him a happy retirement. He was even presented with an honorary Freedom of Penn certificate by the parish council.
He has not only supplied meat, fruit and veg to countless families over the past 40 years (the jolly, carol-singing, wine-drinking queue outside his shop on Christmas Eve became a village highlight), but he has generously supported and organised so many village events and charities.
He was deeply involved in the organisation of balls, dinners, BBQ’s, fetes and other fund raising gatherings for Tylers Green First and Middle Schools, the Fun Run, the Sports and Social Club and Penn School as well as village-wide social events. He has spent hours putting questions together for school quizzes, where he often acted as quiz-master.
That special bond reached a crescendo ten years ago when the entire community backed a campaign to keep Joe in business.
His landlords wanted him out and at first produced plans to convert the shop into a house. But the council knocked that on the head ruling that at least part of the property should be retained for retail purposes.
The landlords then came up with a sneakier plan to redevelop the property including a small retail area within it. That would have entailed the “temporary closure” of the shop while building took place.
Of course, it would have been difficult for a one-man business like Joe’s to have withstood even a temporary closure. Even if he had the landlords could have legitimately increased his rent on the basis the property was improved, probably making his business unviable.
The council had the guts to reject that proposal too, even though its planning officers recommended acceptance and councillors knew the council would likely have to bear the cost of an appeal, which the landlords would inevitably lodge.
The appeal was lodged, but the landlords hadn’t reckoned on the strength of community feeling. Petitions and publicity campaigns in support of Joe were launched and the Government planning inspector deciding the issue was inundated with letters and messages stressing just how important Joe and his business were to the Penn and Tylers Green community.
After a two year battle the Government planning inspector ruled in favour of Joe, accepting the fact that the shop was a “valued facility in the community” and that its loss would have been against planning policy. He even dismissed the landlord’s application for costs against the council.
That result enabled Joe and his family to decide for themselves when the time was right to call it a day. And, sadly for the community, that day has come. Everyone wishes Joe and Larrayne a happy and contented retirement.
*The end of an era. A look at some of the past butcher’s shops in Penn and Tylers Green. See further below this blog.
Progress at last on a village eyesore? Fresh attempt to bring the Doll’s House back to life
MEANWHILE, one of those former butcher’s shops has changed its name to commemorate its history…and hopefully its luck.
The former Clarke’s butchers on the corner of Elm Road Penn and Church Road Tylers Green has been empty and looking pretty shabby now for seven years. That’s because its owners have had a devil of a job trying to get permission to convert it into residential accommodation.
Now new owner Dan Upward, who was successful in converting the former Cottage Bookshop in Elm Road into accommodation without causing too much upset – both buildings are in the Penn and Tylers Green Conservation Area – is having a fresh go.
The shop has had various incarnations since it ceased to be a butcher’s in 1988. In one it became a haberdashery shop called The Doll’s House and the name stuck until the present day, even though it spent its last few years as a business as an estate agents.
The council has long accepted that it can no longer be a commercial premises. There’s no parking; it’s on the corner of two busy roads and, by today’s standards, it’s very small and cramped.
It’s that smallness that caused planning problems in the past – it is so close to neighbouring properties it has been difficult to design something that doesn’t contravene current privacy and amenity rules.
But Mr Upward hopes he’s cracked that with some new interior design which keeps the existing first floor as a self-contained flat and also converts the ground-floor shop into living accommodation too… all without changing the outside appearance of the building, which will be spruced up, and get round privacy problems.
His agent says he’s also changed the name to Clarke House to avoid confusion because Doll’s House referred to both the shop and a separate dwelling by the courtyard at the back.
Council planners are due to give their yea or nay later this month.
Bending the rules for the sake of humanity
INTEREST in the extraordinary Duleep Singh sisters, who lived in Hammersley Lane, Tylers Green during the Second World War, continues unabated.
In addition to the Kensington Palace exhibition (see February 2026 and July 2025 blogs) an exhibition at the National Archives in Kew last month showed how the the two radical Sikh princesses bent the rules to help Jewish refugees escape Nazi persecution.
Most German Jewish refugees who made it to Britain at that time were registered as aliens and sent to internment camps.
But, as the Register of Electors for 1939 shows (pictured above), Catherine and Sophia Duleep Singh registered their refugees as employees – domestic servants – at their homes, Colehatch House and Rathgenrea in Hammersley Lane, Tylers Green. That meant that when the refugees were considered for internment they were able to prove they had employment and thus be exempt from the camps.
The sisters saved at least a dozen German Jews during the war and in addition took in three child evacuees from London, making their homes a hive of activity.
Most villagers remembered the eccentric old ladies fondly, recalling how they would be regularly seen stomping through muddy fields walking their dogs in “wellies and pearls”.
The final chop. From five butchers to none in 100 years
THERE HAVE been butchers shops, often with slaughterhouses alongside, in Penn and Tylers Green for hundreds of years. Here’s a look-back.
She confided to her diary: “I think that much of his disagreeable manner is put on to hide a desperate loneliness. His wife suffered from a distressing and painful complaint and put an end to her suffering by drowning herself in the rainwater tank.”
New village community to be built in the grounds of Chalfont’s Epilepsy Centre
PERMISSION to build what in effect amounts to a new village in the grounds of the national epilepsy centre in Chalfont St Peter have been given the go-ahead by the Government.
Housing secretary Matthew Pennycook said the millions of pounds released from the sale of the land will ensure the future of the Epilepsy Society and enable valuable research into the disease to be undertaken. Without it, he said, the charity would have become insolvent within five years.
“The Epilepsy Society provides life changing and potentially lifesaving services to sufferers of uncontrolled epilepsy and their families as well as care for those with the most complex epilepsy,” he said. “There is no evidence to suggest that other charities that work with epilepsy fulfil a similar role to the society.”
The plan involves the construction of 975 houses, a 75 bed care home, a primary school and shops and offices. It was supported by leading medics.
The Government was asked by the developers to rule on the plan because Buckinghamshire Council did not get its act together in time to make a decision. Many councillors were thought to be against the proposals because the land is in Green Belt. The views of the public have been kept secret because of Buckinghamshire Council’s planning censorship policy.
*The Hall Barn Estate in Beaconsfield has applied to build 195 houses on its land between the A355 and the London Road. Beaconsfield Town Council has objected, partly on the grounds the land is in Green Belt, but, again, the views of members of the public are not being published because of Buckinghamshire Council’s planning censorship policy.
None of your business! Council snubs public outcry and maintains its planning censorship policy
BUCKINGHAMSHIRE Council has rejected a petition signed by 2,378 electors calling for it to publish public comments on planning applications.
Using its wafer-thin majority on the council the Conservative group also rejected a motion from Penn councillor Jonathan Waters to review the controversial policy. Instead the ruling group voted for an amendment to Cllr Waters’ motion, rendering it meaningless.
The council remains one of a handful of the 337 planning authorities in the country to refuse to publish what members of the public say about planning applications.
Deputy leader Peter Strachan said they did so on legal advice. Lawyers fear that individuals could write personal comments in their letters which could contravene privacy laws.
However over 300 planning authorities have found a way round the privacy laws enabling them to publish public views. The Information Commissioner’s Office told the Local Government Chronicle that the privacy laws do NOT prevent publishing the public’s views on planning (see June blog).
Mr Waters told the council: “The decision to stop publishing comments has affected the openness and transparency residents expect from the planning system. It has affected how the council is perceived.”
Mr Strachan said a “neighbouring authority” had been fined £160,000 over a data breach and Buckinghamshire could not risk council taxpayers money.
What he did not say is that the “neighbouring authority” was Basildon in Essex and the fine, over a comment made about a proposed travellers’ site, was in 2016 when the General Data Protection Regulations (GDPR) were in their infancy and untested.
Will Chequers now take a back seat?
WITH OUR new prime minister determined to spend more time in the north it looks as though the PM’s usual Chilterns retreat – Chequers at Ellesborough – will be in for a quiet time. Andy Burnham has only visited it a couple of times in the first six weeks of his premiership.
Former Labour prime ministers have always loved the place. Harold Wilson, James Callaghan and Gordon Brown packed in as many weekends there as possible.
Tony Blair used it as a home and office – “spending most of the day just sitting out in the garden surrounded by papers”, according to his confidante Alistair Campbell. He added a tennis court to the estate while his children, occasionally accompanied by a young Prince William, swam in the house’s swimming pool.
Ramsay MacDonald, elected the first Labour PM in 1924, based his family there, using it as a retreat from the hustle and bustle of daily politics.
“It’s a place where prime ministers know that birds sing, flowers bloom and body and mind may rest,” he’s quoted as saying. In 1931 he invited Charlie Chaplain for lunch and later the pair walked the local countryside chatting with ramblers.
Its greatest Labour devotee however was Clement Attlee who used it as an office as well as a home, spending every Christmas there. He loved the area and would set up informal meetings with ministers in local pubs, including here in Penn. He and his wife bought Cherry Cottage in Prestwood where they lived for ten years after he was defeated in the 1951 election.
*With the PM in attendance or not, the Government is taking steps to strengthen security at Chequers. Details are being kept secret on security grounds but a planning application shows there are plans to reroof a basement plant room with a new concrete roof including steel beams and a steel deck.
Regional news
Near miss – An inquiry is underway after an Airbus A321 carrying up to 250 passengers had a close encounter with a drone over Marlow as it was preparing to land at Heathrow. The pilot said the drone was close enough to enable crew to see its colour, shape and props spinning. The incident occurred at 4,500 feet (1,370 metres). The legal limit for drone flight is 400 feet (122 metres). Marlow is not within the Heathrow flight restriction zone.
Housing plans – In its final proposals as to where future housing development should be – the Local Plan – Buckinghamshire Council says there should be no further new land released for housing in Penn, Tylers Green or Hazlemere. Significant housing sites already in the pipeline are unaffected. The plan says Beaconsfield Town Hall could be converted and/or extended to allow nine homes but should not be demolished. The site of the former Revolution night club in Maxwell Road, Beaconsfield could accommodate up to 35 homes.
In Amersham a number of small sites are recommended, including part of the Sycamore Road car park which could take up to 140 homes. Similarly, a number of smaller sites are suggested in High Wycombe, the biggest being the now empty Railway Place multi-storey car park which could accommodate up to 70 homes. Most of the proposed mass housing development sites are in the north and central part of the county.
Armed robbery – Local police pursued and caught three armed robbers in a dramatic chase through Beaconsfield. The robbers, dressed in National Crime Agency uniforms, stole jewellery in an audacious smash and grab in broad daylight at Elite Jewellers in Station Road and made off in a Lexus on 12 August. But Thames Valley Police managed to stop the car, recover the jewellery, and arrest three men from London. No one was injured.
Legal wrangle – Residents, councillors and the local MP are calling for an end to the five year legal dispute which has prevented the 16th century Kings Hotel in the centre of Stokenchurch, pictured above, from being repaired. The hotel was left a shallow wreck after a fire in October 2021 but a dispute over compensation between the insurers and the company that owns the building remains unresolved. The company is subject to a winding-up order. A campaign group, headed by a KC, was formed last month to see it restored as a hotel.
Drone centre – Buckinghamshire Council has agreed to contribute over £4million to two futuristic projects in the county: the National Autonomy and Drone Innovation Centre at Westcott near Waddesdon; and the Robert Bosch Centre for Innovation and Excellence at Denham.
New services – A new motorway service station on the M25 – about a mile south of the M40 junction (junction 16) – has been approved by councillors subject to planning conditions. It will be called Colne Valley Services. Plans to build another service station on the M25 four miles further north between junction 16 and 17 (Amersham turn-off) are also in the pipeline.
Rail hub – The six underground platforms for a major west London rail hub near Wormwood Scubs were completed last month. Eight overground platforms are yet to be built at the Old Oak Common station so it will be several years before it is complete. It will link services on HS2, Great Western Railway, the Elizabeth Line and Heathrow Express.
Growing old – Latest figures predict that compared with today there will be a 50 per cent increase in people aged over 85; a 20 per increase in people aged over 65 but a six per cent decrease in the number of under-17s in Buckinghamshire by 2035.
Small print – Watford, for years the largest printing centre in Europe, is now down to a handful of small digital printers following the closure of the giant Odhams Press last month. Sun Printers, the town’s other major printing press, closed in the 1990s.
Large plant – Plans to redevelop the massive Vauxhall Motors site at Luton have been approved. It will become a business park for companies involved in advance manufacturing, logistics and digital industries and could employ up to 2,800 people. Meanwhile, Luton Airport was given the final clearance last month to virtually double its capacity with the addition of a new terminal. It’s feared the expansion will increase aircraft noise over quieter parts of the Chilterns.
Death changes – Deaths in Buckinghamshire will be able to be registered over the phone in the coming weeks. Paper death certificates will no longer be issued and digital copies supplied. In addition, arrangements are being made for most post-mortems in the county to be conducted via a non-invasive CT scanner at Stoke Mandeville Hospital.
Final chapter –The former WH Smith stores in Beaconsfield, Amersham and Windsor – now trading under the name TG Jones following a take-over – closed last month following a company restructuring.
Meet the ancestors – The public were invited to look at a major archeological dig at Slate Meadow in Wooburn Green, pictured above, where scores of trial pits have revealed signs of human occupation from 10,000 years ago when humans were moving from a hunter-gathering lifestyle to becoming the first farmers. Finds by the team from Oxford Archeology have included a bone from a 4,000 year old auroch, a wild cow, and several early flint tools. The site will eventually become a housing estate.
Meanwhile, a few miles away up the Thames, interest in this year’s dig at Cookham Abbey was so high tours sold out within days. Archeology students from Reading University spent three weeks clearing an eighth century well at the centre of one of Britain’s first hospitals/hospices. They’ve also removed 100 skeletons from the site and will spend the next few months discovering the diseases and diets they had.
River clean-up – Regular users of the River Thames will be taking part in a major clean-up this month clearing litter and other debris from its banks. The Environment Agency, responsible for the river’s maintenance, has removed around 100 abandoned and derelict boats from the river in the past year. Locks upriver had to be restricted this year because of the summer drought.
Suicide support – A support group, Survivors of Bereavement by Suicide, has been formed locally to help anyone affected by the loss of someone due to suicide. Details on this link https://buckinghamshirecrematorium.co.uk/chilterns/events-chilterns/coffee-morning-sobs-chiltern/ A fund raising coffee morning is being held next month.
By the way…
- Buckinghamshire’s Conservative led council is finding itself rather accident prone. With critics within the party now threatening to call in party leader Kemi Badenoch over the council’s despised planning censorship policy – it’s thought to be the biggest Tory council in the country to impose it – the local party leadership decided a bit of self-promotion wouldn’t go amiss.
- However, the distribution of a glossy leaflet saying how they are protecting the countryside didn’t go down well with residents around the Gomm Valley, Tylers Green who’ve spent the latter part of the summer covered in dust and grime from bulldozers preparing for housing in the once verdant valley. They were quickly onto the local press to generate some unflattering publicity.
- Then, last month, the council found itself featured in Private Eye magazine’s infamous Rotten Boroughs column. The magazine noted that last year the Conservatives launched their manifesto at the Denham headquarters of the appliance company Bosch. This year the council agreed to provide Bosch with £2million from its growth fund to improve its site. As the magazine pointed out, this was, of course, a complete coincidence.
Firefighters burst in on nudists enjoying the sunshine when fire broke out in a neighbouring field during the long hot summer. They wanted to use the water in the naturists club swimming pool in Gerrards Cross as a back-up when the blaze took hold at the donkey farm in Shire Lane. “It was an unusual interruption but we were happy to help,” the club secretary told the local press.
Welcome to the home of the King’s English. Or should that be Knig’s English? Picture: Jeff Wright.
You can contact this blog at peter@pennandtylersgreen.com It will be updated as necessary during September and fully updated on 1 October.