The trustee's are very pleased to now announce that planning permission and listed building consent were approved by Swale Borough Council's planning department, under officers delegated powers, yesterday afternoon.

This is a great and important step forward for our project and the trust would like to take this opportunity to thank Hugh Broughton and Martin Ashley architects for their collaboration and work to date on the project, which has undoubtedly had a huge impact on this decision from the local planning authority.

Although this is a great achievement there is still much to accomplish and we are still awaiting key funding decisions before the project can actually start to be delivered.

We would, of course, like to thank members of the community for their kind support particularly to those who have sent letters and emails to assist our applications and we hope that you can show continued support as the project moves forward.