THE future of the long-vacant Priory has been thrown further into doubt after Firoz Kassam claimed he ‘never’ agreed to repair the much-missed Oxford United pub.

Oxford City Council has taken enforcement action against Mr Kassam’s firm Firoka, which holds a 99-year lease on the council-owned Grade II listed building.

It said that when the firm was given permission for a three-storey hotel next to the site a condition was attached forcing Firoka to carry out repair to the pub.

But the firm has now formally asked for that condition to be removed, claiming it never agreed to spruce up the pub, which has been vacant since 2013.

The statement from JPPC chartered town planners, on behalf of Firoka, said: “For the avoidance of doubt, our client has never agreed to the improvements to Minchery Farm requested under the condition, and for the council to seek to enforce this now is contrary to long established guidance on planning conditions."

JPPC argued that the improvements Firoka was forced to make were not related to the hotel itself and therefore couldn’t be enforced.

It said: “When allowing the proposal there was no suggestion from the council that improvements to the Minchery Farmhouse (aka The Priory) were required to make the hotel proposal acceptable in planning terms.

“Further still, the improvements would not be directly related to the development.”

It also showed the pub outside the boundary of the hotel development.

The condition was attached to the hotel plans to make sure the Priory pub was ‘rejuvenated by the hotel development and become the fulcrum of his development’.

After negotiations over the pub broke down earlier this year, Mr Kassam said the city council planners were ‘happy to let it rot’ and called on them to ‘come to their senses’ and help bring the building back to life and be commercially viable.

The city council’s board member for planning, Alex Hollingsworth, said they would treat the application on merit while continuing the enforcement process.

He said: “The applicant is entitled to submit an application to vary the condition.

“This building is subject to separate ongoing planning enforcement for the apparent breach of the existing planning conditions.

“The application will be considered in the same way as any other application and we will consider the merits of the request against the reason for imposing the condition and all other material planning matters.”

The Priory was built in the mid-1400s as a rebuild of part of Littlemore Priory, a nunnery founded in 1110.

A decision on Firoka’s attempt to remove the condition is expected to be made by June 13.