A COUPLE’S retirement plans have been thrown into turmoil after it was revealed land behind their home could become a cemetery.

Jenny and Francis Pine, who live just outside Horspath, planned to retire to Norfolk as part of a house exchange with a couple there.

But that all changed when Oxford City Council started looking to convert three acres of land the couple lease and 16 acres behind, next to Shotover Country Park, into a cemetery.

Their council-owned house, behind Horspath Athletic Ground, is the only one that would be affected.

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The couple, in their 70s, say when their grown-up daughters Abigail and Naomi move, the small holding – where they keep two miniature shetland ponies, five alpacas and four chickens – will be too much for them.

But now they say they are stuck with a house they no longer want and the prospect of their garden being turned into a burial ground.

Mrs Pine, 73, said: “We’re completely in limbo. We should be in Norfolk, but we can’t move house because no one wants to live here.”

She said the Norfolk couple pulled out after hearing about the cemetery.

Mr Pine, now 75, was a self-employed gardener and Mrs Pine was a full-time mother.

They said: “If we could afford to move, we would.”

What makes the family even more upset is that the council originally eyed up a neighbouring field for the new cemetery, but that was rejected by Oxford Preservation Trust on the grounds it would spoil the view.

The trust gave the entire swathe of land near Horspath to the council in 1952 on the agreement it would have the final say on any future developments.

Mrs Pine said: “As far as we were concerned the first field was perfect, but the preservation trust rejected it.

“We wish they had said yes to that site. It wouldn’t have affected anyone.

“This new site will take so much work. It is ridiculous when the city council were more than content with the original site.

“They have mucked our lives up then said they haven’t got any legal responsibility to give us a better house because we are adequately housed.”

Daughter Abigail said of the council’s plans: “While we understand they need a new cemetery, we wish they had included us in discussions from the beginning.”

The family moved to the house six years ago, after they were flooded out of their South Hinksey home in 2007’s floods.

City council spokesman Chofamba Sithole said: “We are doing a series of tests to ascertain whether the sites may be used for a cemetery.”

But he said it would be “presumptuous” to answer questions about whether the couple would be eligible for any help or compensation at this point as the council was testing the site, “not building a cemetery”.

The Oxford Mail was unable to contact Oxford Preservation Trust for a comment.

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