Comedian Jason Manford has criticised villagers who objected to a retrospective planning application for a riding school which helps deprived children saying they 'should know better'.

The popular TV personality turned up at Wednesday's meeting (29 October) of Cheshire East's strategic planning board to 'speak up for children who have nothing' and support an application from Higher Farm Equine at Over Peover to change the use of land and buildings from agriculture to equestrian use.

This includes private livery, outdoor arena and equine-assisted learning.

Twenty-four residents and the countryside charity CPRE objected to the application and ward councillor Anthony Harrison (Con) told the meeting the site sits in the green belt and has historically consisted of a cluster of agricultural sheds.

Cllr Phillip Welch, representing Peover Superior and Snelson Parish Council, which objected, said: "What is being proposed here, or has actually been implemented now, is a riding centre with potentially more than 100 vehicle movements a day…

"What we've got now is people coming and going in Ubers to the site. They're speeding down the driveway at high speed."

Mr Manford, a friend of the applicant, told councillors he was at the meeting to speak up for children whose lives were being changed by Higher Farm, 'the children born into chaos or poverty'.

"They can't be here in this chamber to defend Higher Farm," he said.

"They can't tell you what it means to finally walk into somewhere where they're not being laughed at, they're not being called a problem, where they can brush a horse and feed a goat, or just be in the countryside."

Mr Manford said at an earlier meeting – not a Cheshire East meeting – someone had said 'why are their problems becoming mine?'.

"These words don't come from empathy, they come from entitlement," he told councillors.

"They come from people who have everything – stability, comfort, opportunity – handed down like furniture, people who talk about protecting the countryside, but what they really mean is protecting it from anyone who doesn't look like me."

He said the problems they referred to were children – 'children who grow up surrounded by concrete and chaos, who've never seen a field that wasn't forbidden, fenced off'.

"Higher Farm to them isn't just therapy," he told the committee. "It's a window into another way of living.

"It's clean air and it's calm and it's what the green belt is meant for – to be shared by everyone, not hoarded by the fortunate few who happen to be born near it."

Gawsworth councillor Lesley Smetham (Con) said: "I think what's being done on the farm is admirable. It's what we need."

Councillors did raise concerns about speeding, but officers said signage could be used.

Cllr Stewart Gardiner (Knutsford, Con) who moved the application be approved, said: "The reality is that the level of activity being proposed by this scheme is far less than what you could potentially expect if this site was being used to its optimum as an agricultural facility."

He added: "I think that Mr Manford has incredibly eloquently explained why this is such an important facility.

"It might not change the world, but it will change the world for the young people who use it."

Cllr Steve Edgar (Haslington, Con) seconded approval, saying: "I attended the site visit on Friday, and I was mightily impressed with what they're doing.

"The site itself is spacious, clean, tidy."

The application was approved, subject to conditions, with seven councillors voting in favour and one abstaining.

A separate application for the siting of a static caravan on the site was also approved, with conditions.