Subject: 26FOI 103 - Buckler - Acknowledgement From: NIO FOI Direction: received Date: Tue, 08 Sep 2026 11:06 UTC Institution: Northern Ireland Office Refs: 26FOI103 Archive id: gm-1a080b3334e0eb9f ------------------------------------------------------------ Dear Sion Buckler, Thank you for your enquiry of 29/08/26 to the Wales Office. Your request is being handled under the Freedom of Information Act 2000 (FOIA). We will endeavour to provide you with a response within the twenty-working day deadline provided by section 10(1) of the Act and no later than 28/09/26. If you have any queries or concerns about the FOI process please do not hesitate to contact us, remembering to quote the reference number above in any correspondence. Yours sincerely, Freedom of Information Team [image: image.png] *From:* Sion Buckler <[email redacted]> *Sent:* 29 August 2026 21:12 *To:* Correspondence, Wales Office <[email redacted]> *Subject:* Williams Heirs, Great House Farm, Llandough (Est. 1667) Secretary of State, I write as the representative of my family, the House of Williams/Buckler, concerning Great House Farm (Ty Mawr), Llandough — an approximately 800-year-old manorial house which we occupied continuously from 1667 until its destruction in 1988, with me as an infant at the time, practically still inside the house, with my pregnant mum. It was my birthplace and our family’s home and land. And it still appears to be our land, despite BP being awarded possession in 1987. I discovered that the final ruling (for possession, not determination of ownership) was based on a quiet 1983 land registry by BP of our land, in their names, without disclosing my disabled widow pensioner’s ownership claim, who also conveniently died in the two weeks she would have had to challenge this registration, not that she was even made aware. It also states our possession was adverse from 1955. But that was on a land parcel we rented and defaulted on, to the east of ours, not the parcel our home and garden and farm was on. Our parcel we occupied since 1667; we owned from 1928 when we made our last payment on it. Originally an 1877 agreement which went missing from our home in the 1940s, but even without that paper title, having not paid since 1928, our possession and ownership would have qualified as adverse by 1940. Furthermore, this 1983 land registry non-contest by my nan was after 55 consecutive years of her asserting ownership, after the 1877 agreement between Bute quarryman Daniel Thomas & Son enacted in 1928, when quarrying completed. An agreement her statements report was stolen from our home in the mid-1940s. Providing both the name of the thief who confessed to stealing it and the estate agent who contracted him to do so. It appears from my research so far that while a field we rented to the east of our land was repossessed, for which our possession might very well have been adverse from 1955, our land parcel was falsely and wrongfully treated as being part of the systematic repossession of the adjacent land parcel, which BP merged into theirs in 1983 from what I can gather. I believe this confusion stems from the definition of “whole farm” (as cited in the 1955 court order) which changed from two parcels of land in the 1916 agricultural tenancy (conveyed to Western Ground Rents by the Marquess of Bute in 1938) to one parcel of land following the enactment of the 1877 agreement in 1928 (after 51 years of our payments, reportedly £4 a year). Furthermore, the modern tenancy/agricultural tenancy Western Ground Rents placed my great-grandfather into in 1939 for the land parcel to the east of ours was, according to Leckwith archived records, only for the one parcel to the east of ours and not both parcels. In addition to the definition of “whole farm” being misunderstood to still include our parcel after 1928, introducing ambiguity in the 1955 order, the order of possession for Western Ground Rents’ land parcel to the east of the one we owned and occupied (since 1667) also says our land parcel (home and garden) was excluded from the order, but not because we owned it, but because of my grandmother’s “condition (having just had a leg amputated) and her resistance”. It does not mention her assertion of ownership. This made our occupancy appear permissive and is what BP later tried in 1974 with their permissive occupancy licence letters. The basis of the pinnacle of this dispute: the landmark legal case BP v Buckler 1987. I say all this at least to defend my grandmother’s honour. After her conveniently timed death in 1983, during the 1987 hearing in which she was unable to defend herself, the judge took it upon himself to enter onto the record that my grandmother “conceived the notion” she owned the farm. He also dismissed my father’s appeal, citing that both BP companies were all the same. But in the ruling in BP’s favour prior, the judge said “had my nan challenged BP Pension Trust, it wouldn’t have counted as BP Properties, the plaintiff, were a different company”. Which is not just a “heads they win, tails we lose” procedural unfairness matter. But the legal precedent that landmark legal case set by ruling my grandmother “accepted the permissive occupancy and offer from BP and their licence letters in 1974, because she didn’t expressly reject them” is firstly absurd by any sane, reasonable person’s standards. Secondly, that 1987 case excluded a newspaper article from 1974 whereby my nan expressly rejects, even got 1,000+ people to sign a petition against their housing development plan of 13 houses (likely on their parcel to the east, not ours as they never owned ours) and the article reports her stating her lawyer had assured her her ownership claim was valid. And she asserts “it’s my home”. And further to all that, it is documented the court never ruled in 1974. Not adjudicating ownership in the first hearing, which was adjourned. And not ruling for possession in the second hearing in 1974, which was quashed. Firstly because the clerk called them press when my disabled nan crawled to court begging for an audience with the judge after forced attempts to remove her. Including water being shut off for months, resulting in my infant aunt having to go live with another family. And all our cows drinking from the river and dying. The other factor is while the public and press and family all had a victory, my nan’s lawyers, BP and the courts quashed the case. But what they did was call to mention the offer to my nan, and quashing it instantly before she had opportunity to respond. We may still have the tape recording. So it is not a case of her not responding and so she accepted. It is a case that the decades of rejection and petition and press reports were concealed and suppressed, along with these important facts, and the backdated licence letters BP produced afterwards in 1974 and clandestine 1971 alteration of our land parcel on the Ordnance Survey, and conveyance from BP Pension Trust to Properties in 1975, and land registration in 1983, unbeknown to us or anyone I suspect, was not meeting of the minds by a long shot. Yet was all that was heard or considered in 1987. The 1987 case was not judged on the merits of the case as it should not even have been held in the court it was in. The court it was decided in was the least applicable court of them all. A Chancery/Queen’s Bench i.e. equity court would have been the appropriate court. Further to even all this, an attempt was made by Western Ground Rents to get my nan into a tenancy in 1949 too, for our plot. Which my nan expressly rejected in lieu of her assertion of ownership. Even with our paper title stolen prior to that attempt, having not paid since 1928 our possession, even if adverse, would have qualified us as owners through adverse possession by 1940 in any case. WGR generated a possession order for our land, based on the ambiguity they introduced into the 1955 order, which was never enforced and is the interest they conveyed to BP in 1969, when conveying the land they possessed east of ours. BP then altered the Ordnance Survey in 1971, shifting the title “Ty Mawr” from the land parcel to the east onto our land parcel. And appending “Farm” to the descriptor. Making our parcel better fit the defective title chain being forged, in lieu of my nan’s missing title chain. The 133 houses they are seeking to build on that land parcel, ours (now Church View Close) was merged into, is defective. The title chain traces back to and through us to what may be the 1,000 freehold issued by Knight Sir Herbert to the Vaughan family in the 1500s. It is even possible we have been playing the role of virtual freeholder on our land parcel, or even tenant on the land east of ours. When all things considered, like the fact we occupied the manorial house since 1667, may even make it possible that we were and still are the rightful freeholders of Llandough Town (formerly Cedwyn Estate), with 640 years left on that freehold. Because Bute’s purchase of the last Vaughan heirs’ estate reportedly did not include our Ty Mawr. And Ty Mawr (alias Cefin (a possible attempt at Cedwyn) according to an 1824 David Stewart survey) was not just our home or land parcel, but enough parcels to conclude the estate being half the town of Llandough. So this all may be a lot bigger and run a lot deeper than even what I am bringing to your attention. Our family also have bloodline connections to the Vaughan, and so it is not just title, estate and deeds. I only focus on the parcel we own, for which possession was awarded to BP, to begin unravelling truths long suppressed and concealed. In 1974 an ownership hearing did occur to adjudicate the ownership dispute, but seeing as my nan could not present her title as it was stolen, the hearing was adjourned. BP then tried to enforce the 1962 possession order. So in summary: July 1974 = possession case, adjourned, never finally decided. September 1974 = old 1962 possession order revived. October/November 1974 = threatened eviction stopped and warrant withdrawn. Not licence letters, quashed hearing, but in fact because of overwhelming court clerk, press and public support. Another dimension of this, of which there are many, including BP Bailiffs being undercover soldiers and/or accompanied by soldiers, allegedly even SAS, is the abrupt demolition of our 800-year-old “county treasure” home. 4am the morning after, almost simultaneously, CADW refused to spot-list it as Grade II, the council refused to issue a demolition stop order and our High Court injunction preventing demolition or removal of our property (all of our furniture from Cardiff Castle etc.) got overturned. This surely should not have happened prior to the appeal procedure of those decisions concluding, to say the least. More indications of Government involvement/military operation. Which I do not just say as a military warfare professional, but because other evidence supports it (including recently declassified ITV coverage which may not even have aired). Along with fraud and all the concealment, there are grounds to exercise the clause in the Limitation Act and reopen this case. I formally submit the accompanying CADW — Forensic Critique, Great House Farm (Ty Mawr), Llandough – Version 5.0.0 (August 2026). I also enclose a mock application to an AI-assisted mock Chancery Court I am working with. I have been using iterative research and legal-analysis processes to test and refine the arguments arising from the historical evidence, pending any formal legal proceedings on behalf of my family. I include it not as a substitute for legal proceedings, but to give your Office the wider context in which I am examining what happened. And an illustration of a final single legal case which articulates my family’s grievances. If they were not all so terrified to speak out, still now, even after 38 years. The CADW Forensic Critique is deliberately evidence-led. It distinguishes between established facts, reasonable inferences and matters which cannot presently be established because the underlying records no longer appear to be available. Its central concern is straightforward: Cadw cannot presently produce sufficient surviving evidence to explain how its December 1988 decision was reached, nor can it presently explain what happened to the records documenting that decision. Albeit we are still corresponding to establish the facts. In any case what has been established thus far is particularly troubling given what happened immediately afterwards. In 1988, Cadw publicly stated that it was considering an appeal to the Secretary of State for Wales to protect the building. The South Wales Echo reported on 3 December 1988 that an inspector would visit “this weekend” and liaise with RCAHMW. The building was then demolished overnight on 5/6 December 1988, within hours of the refusal and the simultaneous dismissal of a High Court injunction. I am therefore asking your Office to help, at the very least in this correspondence with CADW, to establish as precisely as possible what happened. 1. Contact between Cadw and the Welsh Office / Secretary of State Please confirm, deny or clarify each of the following: Whether any communication or outreach took place between Cadw, or its predecessor functions, and the Office of the Secretary of State for Wales / Welsh Office concerning Great House Farm during the period July–December 1988. Whether any recommendation, briefing, submission, notification or formal appeal concerning the protection or listing of Great House Farm was submitted to the Secretary of State. Whether my family, as the occupiers and asserted owners of the property, was ever consulted, contacted or notified by Cadw or the Welsh Office before the refusal decision of 5 December 1988. If such communications occurred, I ask that the surviving records be identified and disclosed. If they did not occur, I ask that this be stated clearly. 2. What happened to the 1988 assessment records? Cadw’s responses, including FOI ATISN 27021, the response from Amy Longford dated 10 July 2026, the subsequent internal review, and the response from Dr Andy Wigley dated 27 August 2026, indicate that: only the two July 1988 photographs have been located; no assessment file, inspector’s notes, decision record or internal correspondence has been located; no destruction record, transfer list, accession record or archive schedule has been located; and Cadw has stated that unsuccessful listing assessments were historically retained for approximately three years before transfer or destruction under the Public Records Act 1958. This raises an obvious question which I hope your Office will appreciate is important to my family: If the records were destroyed, transferred or otherwise disposed of, where is the record showing that this happened and under whose authority? I therefore request the immediate production of any surviving destruction, disposal, transfer or accession documentation relating to the Great House Farm 1988 assessment file, including certificates, dockets, lists, database entries, retention schedules, disposal authorities or other contemporaneous records held by the Welsh Office, its predecessors, Cadw, or any repository to which relevant records were transferred. Where such a record exists, please provide its exact wording and identify, insofar as recorded: the file reference; the disposal or transfer authority; the date of the action; the relevant retention period; and the officer or authority responsible for authorising it. If any residual material remains in existence, I ask that it be preserved immediately and not destroyed, transferred or otherwise disposed of while these matters remain under examination. If no destruction, disposal or transfer documentation exists, I ask that your Office confirm that expressly. 3. The unanswered questions surrounding the decision itself I also ask your Office to address, or to require Cadw to address, the outstanding questions identified in Part XII of the accompanying Forensic Critique. In particular: Who was the decision-maker responsible for the refusal on 5 December 1988? What was the registered file reference, title and record series? What evidence was actually considered? Was the 1974 RCAHMW survey (ST 16817331) considered? Were SMR 2038/2038s and the relevant 1978–1980 GGAT reports considered? What was the basis, authorship and status of the July 1988 “YYY” coding? What communications took place with BP Properties or its agents, the local planning authority, RCAHMW, GGAT or the High Court during the critical period? Was a Building Preservation Notice considered? What retention and disposal schedule applied to the assessment? What was the scheduled disposal/review date? Who authorised disposal, if disposal occurred? Which repositories and catalogues have been searched, including The National Archives and historic Welsh Office records? Do comparable unsuccessful listing assessments from 1988–1991 survive, and if so, how were they retained? These are not questions I ask simply because I disagree with the historical decision. I am trying to establish what evidence was before the decision-maker, what process was followed, and what happened to the official record afterwards. That distinction matters. 4. Independent verification I therefore ask your Office to confirm whether it has searched, or will now search, The National Archives catalogue and relevant historic Welsh Office transfer documentation for records concerning Great House Farm. If this has not already been done comprehensively, I ask that it be undertaken and that Cadw be asked to undertake any corresponding searches necessary to establish whether the missing assessment material was ever transferred elsewhere. I would also ask that any surviving records relating to the case be preserved while these enquiries are ongoing. 5. Why I am asking I appreciate that this is a historic matter. But for my family it is not simply history. This was our home. It was the place into which I was born, and the destruction of the building came at the end of a much longer dispute concerning our family’s occupation, land and property rights. I have spent considerable time reconstructing what happened from surviving court records, land records, archaeological evidence, newspapers, archival material, FOI responses and contemporary documentation. I am not asking your Office to accept every conclusion I have drawn. I am asking for something more fundamental: where the Government and its agencies can still establish what happened, I ask that they do so; where the evidence no longer exists, I ask that they say so plainly; and where the record of its disappearance should exist, I ask that it be identified. My family has lived with the consequences of these events for decades. I believe that, at this stage, the least that can reasonably be expected is openness, proper record-keeping and an honest examination of what happened. I therefore ask that this correspondence, together with the attached CADW — Forensic Critique v5.0.0, be treated as a formal request for recorded information under the Freedom of Information Act 2000, as well as a request for clarification of the records-management position concerning Cadw and the historic Welsh Office functions now falling within the responsibility of your Office. I would be grateful for a substantive response addressing each of the matters above individually. Yours sincerely, Sion Buckler (Ret’d Sergeant) Royal Signals Cyber/Electronic Warfare Professional and Life Member ------------------------------ This e-mail and any attachments is intended only for the attention of the addressee(s). 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