FORMER council house homeowners across the Forest are celebrating after a judge threw out Two River Housing Association's claims to have a right to levy charges for grass cutting and maintenance.

District Judge Daniels judgement was emphatic. In it he:

•Dismissed Two Rivers' claims

•Ordered Two Rivers to pay the defendents costs

•Cancelled or 'vacated' the intended trial date in October.

The judgement provoked immediate calls for the resignations of the charity's chief executive, Garry King, and director of resources, Barry Thompson, as well as accusations of long-running 'bully boy tactics.'

The dispute first surfaced back in 2009 when Two Rivers issued grass cutting and maintenance bills to homeowners who had bought under the 'right to buy' scheme dating back to 1980. It has since just issued charges for pavement maintenance.

The homeowners argued there was nothing in their conveyances to say they were required to pay such maintenance charges.

Two Rivers countered by saying they owed the money because they 'used and enjoyed' access to the Two Rivers estate.

After a series of demands and threats of legal action, the case went to court on June 3, largely financed by collections made throughout the Forest by a fighting fund.

Tracey Ashford of Rowbis Solicitors acting for three of the four defendants – Julian and Sandra Harrison, Mr and Mrs Jones and Mr G Davis and Phyllis Page of Lydney – explained.

"We went to court on the third of June with what's called a summary judgement application. This means to ask the judge to decide the case on the papers alone to decide whether it has real prospects of succeeding at a full trial. It was our view that Two Rivers Housing did not have any prospect of succeeding and that's why we made the application to district judge Daniel at Bristol County Court.

"He heard the arguments on June 3 but reserved judgement. He'd heard everything but he wanted time to think.

"We received the order from District Judge Daniel last Thursday confirming that the claim had been dismissed. That meant the whole case was dismissed and claims against our clients dismissed.

"We are awaiting a written judgement which will become a matter of public record, but we don't have that yet. The order shows we've won but it would be nice to know what swayed the judge and his reasoning behind the order."

Malcolm Norris from Bream, a committee member of fighting fund, said: "After three years the news has come that the charges made in the law courts by Two Rivers Housing Association, against innocent ex-council house owners, have been rejected.

"Two Rivers did their best to convince thousands of people that they were in debt and that were required to pay towards the grass cutting on the ex council estates, all because of an ambiguous clause in their conveyances (Deeds).

"The management of TRH were not prepared to listen to the owner/occupiers representatives at the meetings arranged at Mitchel­dean, neither were they prepared to listen to the many individuals who sought and paid for advice from solicitors.

"Anyone directly involved with the last three years events are aware that many of those being pursued by TRH are OAPs, a number are now in their 80's, remember, the 'right to buy' made the statute books on October 3 1980, these people were relatively young at that time.

"The Two Rivers Housing board of directors along with their chief exective were always aware of the above facts, but chose to ignore them, all the time invoicing people with fictitious bills (we can call them this because there was nothing to say they were otherwise), and accepting payments from people whose personal principles would not allow them to be in debt to anyone, the habit of a lifetime.

"Thank goodness there were people willing to support the fund, to raise the thousands of pounds needed to pay solicitors and barristers' bills for the 'test case' to take place.

"The conclusion we all must draw from this is, that a 'charity' that uses bullying tactics as one of its tools of business, are a blight on society and a disgrace to humanity."

Another committee member, Amanda Sterry, added: "I now think that the positions of Garry King and Barry Thompson are untenable and I would call for them to resign," a view endorsed by former district council Alistair Fraser from Sedbury.

In a brief statement, Dave Garnett, chair of the board of Two Rivers Housing, said: "We are aware of the summary judgement and are awaiting full details of the court's decision. Once we have received these we will be in a position to comment further."