A home owner says he must sell the house he was born in because a council won't allow him to rebuild the listed building.

John Sykes's family home at Appleton Roebuck has fallen into decay since being unoccupied after his grandparents died 20 years ago.

But efforts to demolish it and build a new house on the site have been rejected by Selby District Council because the huge farmhouse, called Southfields, is a Grade II listed building.

And the council has had a court order put on him banning him from working on the house, owned by his family since the 1930s.Now he feels the only option open to him is to sell.

He said: "All I want to do is build a house on the site which I would be able to live in. I could make sure it looked the same, but it would be habitable.

"I do want to live there, but at the moment it just can't be used and the council will not allow me to demolish it." The house, a focal point in the centre of the village, was built more than 200 years ago.

Now it stands derelict, with boarded windows and surrounded by piles of rubble.

Selby District Council took Mr Sykes, who lives in a cottage next to Southfields, to court earlier this year and obtained an injunction to prevent work after he demolished its rear wing without permission.

Mr Sykes claims the work was essential after winter winds blew trees on to the roof.

He must now get special permission before he can do any work, and the council is in the process of getting a compulsory purchase order - a move which Mr Sykes welcomes.

He said: "I want them to buy it from me because this situation has cost me an absolute fortune over the years in fees for solicitors and builders.

"But they are taking so long to do anything that I decided to try to sell it myself. I don't want to sell it. I want to build a house I can live in, but I feel like I'm being forced to give it up because there is nothing else I can do."

He said that £30,000 had already been spent on the house. Estimates to carry out work to restore it were between £150,000 and £200,000, he added.

"It is ridiculous because the house just isn't well built or good looking," he said.

"If it did look nice it would have been preserved."

Senior planning officer at the council, Diane Khajehnoori, said: "I understand why Mr Sykes feels the way he does, but for a couple of years he has been told he must do something about his building and we have tried to help him to do it.

"I daresay he has an emotionally strong case. Listed buildings can be a burden, but he has an obligation to maintain it and if he can't do that we have to take it on."

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