GARDENERS have reached a legal milestone after a decade-long battle with councillors over their allotments.

The occupiers of the Briarfields site, in Hartlepool, who were evicted two years ago, have emerged victorious after a report investigated the actions of Hartlepool Borough Council.

For more than ten years, the allotment holders and council officials have been at loggerheads over the sale of the land for executive homes.

The council evicted the gardeners in 2003, and flattened the land, in a bid to sell the prime location off Elwick Road.

However, a report from the Local Government Ombudsman has ruled in favour of the gardeners.

A copy of the report, which has been handed to The Northern Echo, found the council guilty of maladministration.

It states: "The failure of the council amounts to maladministration. The decision to serve notices to quit amount to avoidable injustice to the tenants of Briarfield.

"To remedy this injustice, the council should give serious thought to re-establishment of Briarfields as an allotment site."

In a double victory, the council has back-tracked its plans to develop the site and the cabinet ruled that the land was now not appropriate for development and should be retained for allotment use.

The man leading the fight for the gardeners, retired consultant physician Dr Peter Pickens, said the latest developments was a step in the right direction, but there is still a long way to go.

He said: "We are obviously very pleased with the report, but we are not celebrating yet. The council has yet to discuss the findings.

"It has been a long battle, but we were not going to sit back and see houses built on our plots. We are all eager to get back to our allotments for next year's growing season."

At a meeting last Tuesday, the cabinet ruled that the allotment plans be removed from future council proposals. A further meeting this week will consider that ruling.

A council spokesman said: "The council's cabinet has already recommended that the proposed Local Plan be amended so that the former allotments and adjacent land is no longer allocated for housing.

"The cabinet has also requested a further report on the implications of re-instating the allotments."