Residents at a Park Home in Bracknell are outraged at the ‘frightening’ pitch fee increases they are being subjected to. 

A Park Home is the commonly used term for a mobile home that is located on a protected site – like the estate at Warfield Park. 

Occupants, who are predominantly pensioners, are required to pay a ‘pitch fee’ - a compulsory cost paid to the site owner in order to keep the home on a particular park - which can be anything from around £1,000 to £3,000 a year. 

READ MORE: London Road in Bracknell set for 81 new home development

The Mobile Homes Act 2013 allows pitch fees to be increased in line with the retail price index (RPI) inflation each year. However, as pensions increase in line with the consumer price index (CPI), many residents are facing increasingly unaffordable fees.  

A Warfield Park resident, John Manning, said: “We are pensioners and therefore on a fixed income. Our pitch fee rose by around 7.2 per cent [last month]. 

“Any further increase will directly impact us.” 

Mr. Manning and other Park Home residents from around the country have been working with the Park Home Owners Justice Campaign (PHOJC) to resolve the problem since 2014.  

They even received a promise from the government in 2017 that the issue would be tackled - however, to date, nothing has been done. 

READ MORE: Boost in Bracknell's electric charge points

The founder of PHOJC, Sonia McColl, said: “We have had mass letters go into the minister, Michael Gove, and we have not had any sensible reply from that. 

“Most local MP’s have gone along the same party line that the government has promised that it will be addressed when parliamentary time allows. Well, over the last four years parliamentary time does not seem to have been allowed. It really is quite ridiculous.” 

“The offset of this story is we now have RPI being at the most dreadful levels in the country for everyone. For Park Home residents, it means this escalating charge is a lot.  

“The only person that profits from this are site owners […] who are [mostly] millionaires and multi-millionaires. Once it’s [added to] the pitch fee it will be on there forever. It won’t come down again.” 

READ MORE: Plan for former Bracknell business to be converted into flats

Residents claim they are struggling further due to the soaring rise to living costs, including the energy price hike which came into effect in April.  

As with other sites, occupants of Warfield Park will not benefit from the £200 energy bill rebate issued by the government. They are contractually obliged to purchase energy from the park owner, who does not qualify for the government protection scheme. 

Mr. Manning added: “In the main, most residents here would not be seen as the most affluent of people. For a lot, including us, that's precisely why we are living in a park home rather than bricks and mortar. 

“It is making us use our energy more efficiently, where we can. We are also using the car less.” 

READ MORE: Bracknell plan for new hydrotherapy pool submitted

With a further rise to energy prices expected in October, emails to the campaign group from worried residents have been described by Mrs. McColl as “frightening.” 

She added: “I imagine the consequence of this is people are going to have to reduce their heating bills and their food bills.  

“We are talking about retired people, widows and widowers, so they will be single people living in a home who will only have one source of income and that income is not going to rise.” 

Residents are now waiting to hear if the issue will be addressed in the Queen’s speech on May 10. 

“We have to highlight this and show this government up before the Queens speech, otherwise the outcome is another whole parliamentary session where nothing will happen,” said Mrs. McColl.