A COURT fight over a controversial new visitor centre for Clifford’s Tower is still going ahead, but city councillors could pull out of selling land to English Heritage.

The heritage body announced earlier this month that it was axing its plan for a new building built into the base of the motte, which was initially given planning permission in October 2016. 

However Cllr Johnny Hayes, who led a campaign against the plan, has confirmed that appeal court hearings into the case were still going ahead.

Cllr Hayes said the court hearings, due for July 23, would decide on important archaeology concerns which could have national implications as well as the £60,000 legal costs so far.

He said he had asked City of York Council to agree to “consent to judgement” - meaning the authority would agree with his arguments that the planning process had been flawed - but his request had been turned down.

He added: “We would have liked to have saved the council tax-payers further costs but we have not been able to negotiate a way out of going.”

The Council of British Archaeology is interested in the case, he added, as the Court of Appeal's decision will also settle questions over archaeology in planning applications and the result could have an impact on heritage sites all over the country.

At the same time, the court’s decision could help Cllr Hayes recover some of the £60,000 legal costs - which have so far been covered by £19,000 of crowdfunding donations and by Cllr Hayes himself.

However, the city council has announced it could pull out of a long leasehold deal English Heritage would need to build the centre.

If that deal is scrapped, the council’s leaders have said they hope the legal fight may end.

In a joint statement leader Cllr Ian Gillies and deputy leader Cllr Andrew Waller said: “After English Heritage announced their intention to no longer proceed, residents told us they were concerned construction could still go ahead as planning was still in force.

“As a result we have decided to review the offer of leasehold of the land making it clear that the original visitor centre plans will not go ahead.”

A spokesman added that they hoped the end of the land sale deal would prompt Cllr Hayes to reconsider the legal challenge, but without that the council would “defend the lawfulness of its decision-making that led to the planning approval”.