Anthea Turner told to demolish tennis court at £5million home

The news comes days after the former GMTV presenter disclosed she could be forced to sell the 57 acre estate in Godalming, Surrey, following the collapse of her husband Grant Bovey's £100 million property empire.

Planning officials said that Turner, 48, had treated regulations with "contempt" by building the AstroTurf court – complete with pavilion and floodlights – without permission.

The host of BBC3's The Perfect Housewife had asked for retrospective permission to be approved to allow her to "get on with the more important issues of surviving the credit crunch".

But on Wednesday evening Waverley Borough Council officials ruled that Turner's financial problems did not merit an exception, raising the possibility of a costly public inquiry in April.

Cllr Steve Renshaw said: "I do sympathise to some extent with the considerable expenditure that has obviously been undertaken in this regard. But it's a matter of principle and we need to treat it in the same way as a man with an illegal summerhouse in his back garden that cost a couple of thousand."

Cllr Jim Edwards said: "They have treated the planning process with contempt and it should not be allowed."

In September, Turner and Bovey, 47, were handed an enforcement notice ordering the removal of the court after councillors ruled in February that it contravened planning policy to protect the countryside in the Surrey Hills Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty.

The couple had offered to tear down the floodlights, screen the clubhouse and tennis court with wisteria and plant trees along the boundary of their estate, which also includes stables, polo field and cinema.

Turner even wrote to her local MP Jeremy Hunt, asking for help resolve the dispute.

"On both sides this is all costing a considerable amount of money, something which is not in abundance at the moment," she wrote.

"The quicker we can resolve this situation the quicker everyone can get on with the more important issues of surviving the credit crunch. I don't expect any preferential treatment but would dearly like any guidance on how I can remove this matter from my worry list."

Bovey's buy-to-let company Imagine Homes was taken over by HBOS, its financial backer, in October after business dried up.

"We have had to re-evaluate our lives. I don't think a £5m mansion makes you happy," Turner said earlier this week.
- telegraph.co.uk