Chef giving up on Wick boutique hotel plans after being ‘ignored’ by Highland Council
A private chef is so “scunnered” with Highland Council that he is giving up on his plans to turn a 200-year-old property in Wick into a small boutique hotel.
David Buchanan says he has spent a year “getting absolutely nowhere” in seeking approval for change of use at Blackstairs House and has accused the local authority of stifling investment in the area.
He had hoped to get the go-ahead to provide upmarket hospitality for North Coast 500 tourists while also giving training opportunities to young people.
Mr Buchanan (41) and his partner Kirsty Wybar (39), a lawyer, also have plans to develop Old Bruan Kirk, near Ulbster, as a home and events venue.
If permission is refused for that, they are likely to “walk away” and put Blackstairs House on the market after investing almost £350,000 on buying and renovating it.
Mr Buchanan, a former pupil of Pulteneytown Academy, has cooked for royalty, billionaires and celebrities. He divides his time between London and Wick.
He believed that turning the property in Lower Pulteneytown into a small boutique hotel would “keep people in the town longer so they spend more money”.
In June, Mr Buchanan accused the council of “staggering incompetence” and now he claims the local authority has blocked his emails.
He said this week: “There is no movement, there is no desire clearly from either planning or senior management within the council to want to try and help me.
“We’ve spent a year getting absolutely nowhere. Whichever way you look at it, obviously it’s me that’s the problem because I’ve dared to call Highland Council into question.
“They obviously don’t like being told that they’re incompetent. They obviously don’t like people pointing out their serious shortcomings.”
He says the Blackstairs application was submitted in January. “It was refused, ultimately because they suggested that we had applied for the wrong classification,” Mr Buchanan said.
“The whole point of them existing should be to help people get the planning. If they’re not able to navigate it simply on the website, through the application portal itself, then that’s a failure of them not helping people.
“We were looking at working with different groups within the chamber of commerce and the high school to give kids an opportunity to maybe do some work experience and offer them the benefit of my 30 years in hospitality in terms of training them up.
“What we were trying to do was to make Wick more of a destination, because at the moment there’s just nothing here for tourists apart from driving through it and doing the odd thing here and there.
“There’s nowhere that people would proactively want to come and stay and eat world-leading cuisine by a very experienced, well-travelled chef, drink some of the best wines and whiskies that we can possibly offer.
“The thing that annoys me most is that there’s absolutely no reason. If they turned round and said ‘we don’t want footfall, we don’t want extra cars, [there is] overprovision with the licensing’… If they came back and gave you something tangible, you’d have an opportunity to go away and make remedy, you could try and change the operating plan.
“But you don’t even get that far, which would suggest they’re just not interested in that kind of investment in the town.
“It’s the reason why the High Street looks like it does.
“We’re stuck between a rock and a hard place. We’re just so scunnered with it all just now.
“There is a gross failure across the entirety of the council. If you complain, it’s a complete waste of your time. They don’t even read your complaints.
“It just doesn’t make sense – I have no words any more. My girlfriend and I, we’re just so upset.”
He added: “We’ll know in the next four weeks if Bruan is going to get planning. If the Bruan planning doesn’t pass then we’ll definitely be on the market in the new year, for sure.
“We’re going nowhere fast. To be honest, I’ve wasted 12 months of my life that I’m not getting back, banging my head against a brick wall, begging people for help and just being ignored.
“Realistically if we sold this in the new year and we lost 70 or 80 grand, such is life. That’s what I’m faced with, walking away from the town, having invested so much emotionally.”
A Highland Council spokesperson said: “While the council does not comment on the personal circumstances of individuals, we can confirm that the council does not tolerate unacceptable behaviour from any members of the public towards council staff and councillors.
“Where such circumstances occur, the council’s unacceptable actions policy is followed. In a very small number of circumstances, the council may cease to engage where conduct does not improve.
“Where a planning application submitted to the council is found to be invalid on receipt, the council will write to the applicant to advise them on what is required to allow their planning application to progress. If the outstanding required information is submitted, then the application will be assessed and considered with regard to all material planning considerations.”
Earlier this year Mr Buchanan erected a banner, measuring 12ft x 4ft, on the side of his property overlooking Wick’s historic Black Stairs. The banner, which was on display for about four months, made serious allegations against six named individuals.
