Charlie and Meg's Roundhouse.....Again

“It is well known that the libertarian political philosophy is antagonistic to coercively imposed rules that limit people's freedom to use their private property as they see fit. Indeed, the very essence of libertarianism is the nonaggression principle that condemns the initiation of force against person or property. As a result, libertarians have been critical of zoning laws, which restrict the ability of property owners to develop their property or use it for their desired purposes.”

Ben O'Neill*

I was in the studio when Ian Crane was being interviewed on the local radio station during his visit to the Isle of Man a couple of weeks ago.  I had to suppress a laugh when the presenter asked him if he knew anything about conspiracies on the Isle of Man, Ian said he didn't, but that they would almost certainly involve property developers, as they're corrupt everywhere.

I blogged a while back about the plight of Charlie Hague and Megan Williams, how they'd built a beautiful eco-house, which the local council wanted to tear down because they didn't acquire planning permission.  You can see my rather irate post on it here:

http://deepstatenews.blogspot.com/2013/03/charlie-and-megs-roundhouse.html

Charlie and Meg have started an online petition which they intend to present to Pembrokeshire County Council and the Welsh Assembly, to gain retrospective planning permission.   You can help them out by signing it at the following link:

https://www.change.org/en-GB/petitions/pembrokeshire-county-council-and-the-welsh-assembly-grant-retrospective-planning-permission-to-charlie-and-meg-s-roundhouse

For me the issue is not that this house is beautiful, frankly they could have plonked a concrete block in the middle of their land and I'd still sign the petition.  It's about whether the world is going to work better when people make decisions on how to develop their own private property, or whether we need a group of self appointed experts dictating to everyone else what they can and can't do with their own land.  I know which one the corporate property developers think is the best option.

* Ben O'Neill's full article on zoning in a free society can be read at: http://mises.org/daily/3506

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