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I have my bat licence! Woohoo! Albeit that ours was a pretty simple case (summer roost only, no breeding evidence, unoccupied building and no big trees in close proximity), I'm chuffed that we got our licence through quite speedily. I nagged our architect yesterday about the lack of progress with discharging the planning conditions and this has rather caught him out now, as that's the only thing standing between me and having the property demolished, so time to get on with things. As soon as the roof is off, I will contact the VOA and have the property de-listed to save on council tax - because the property had been vacant for so long, I didn't get any reduction for it being unoccupied, so I'm keen to get this done. I've got my site insurance quotes yesterday and my groundworker is on notice, so we're under starters orders.

Can you hear that? It's the sound of my fingers tapping as I find myself waiting for the wheels of bureaucracy to turn. This time, it's the turn of Natural England and their (hopeful) approval of our bat mitigation strategy and licence to remove the roof from the old bungalow. It takes around 6 weeks for them to decide on a licence application but they are behind by a week or two right now, so that means it could be anything up to 2 months. 2 months! Unbelievable! I've come to the conclusion that this part of self building is like being stuck in the mother of all traffic jams, one that lasts for months and years on end. Still, all I can do is sit and wait and hope to hell that the licence is granted before the bats decide to move back in for the summer, some time in early May, possibly. I've planned to within an inch of my life for stuff to do with the house and I don't think that there's much more I can do at this stage that will be of practical use or run into the danger of overthinking things. My boredom was slightly relieved last week by having the asbestos survey done prior to demolition - nothing nasty, all standard - and getting all the hedges in close proximity to the bungalow taken out by my trusty groundworker. Actually, I do need to have a look into site facilities for once demolition is done as I can't go for a discrete pee behind the hedges now that they are down. Things could get tricky if I start mooning the neighbours. The asbestos survey chap was a pleasant fellow. I rang around for quotes and they seem to all come in at a similar price, in the region of £350 + VAT. I used Mark Harverson of Four Paddock Ltd. He is in Lymington but is happy to travel and was nice to deal with. So, I'm waiting for the soil survey report, the asbestos report and the bat licence, for the architect and MBC to finalise drawings for the building regulations submission. If things get really desperate, I won't be able to ignore work and housework for much longer. Tap, tap, tap...... Edit: A small addition about the asbestos survey. In theory, unless the householder suspects that there is asbestos present, there is no legal obligation to have an asbestos survey carried out prior to demolition. In practice, however, no groundworker will demolish without knowing that you've had one done and what the results were, so best to get it done and out of the way in good time before knocking things down.