The Claygate rugby pitches are on the market, price on application, after Cabinet chose not to pay up to £1.7m to clear the dumped soil. No bidders' meeting.
Elmbridge Borough Council will put the playing fields at Oaken Lane in Claygate on the market rather than clean them up itself, because clearing the soil dumped on them could cost the council as much as £1.7 million.
Updated 2 October: the site is now on the market through Lambert Smith Hampton, price on application, and the 14 October bidders’ meeting has been cancelled. Details below.
Cabinet agreed the site would be marketed at its meeting on Wednesday 16 September. The council confirmed the decision in a news item on 17 September, saying Cabinet had “agreed to market the site for recreational and leisure use”.
The report Cabinet approved is titled “Disposal of land in Oaken Lane, Claygate, Esher” and proposes selling the freehold. Neither the council’s 8 September announcement nor its 17 September one uses the word disposal, sale or freehold anywhere.
The formal Cabinet minutes had not been published when this article was updated on 18 September.
Now on the market, and the bidders’ meeting is off
The council announced on 1 October that the site is being marketed by Lambert Smith Hampton. It has dropped the informal information session for bidders planned for 14 October. It says all the information can be provided “more effectively through published materials”, backed by written questions and answers.
The agent’s listing gives the price only as POA, price on application. It describes:
- about 7.56 acres (3.06 hectares) across two freehold titles
- a detached single-storey clubhouse of 173 square metres, connected to mains services but “in poor condition” and containing asbestos
- the site as vacant and available for future leisure use, subject to consent
The area does not match the Cabinet report, which gave the site as 2.43 hectares. Neither the council nor the listing explains the difference of about 0.6 hectares.
The council’s 17 September statement put the dumped material at about 52,000 tonnes, and says Elmbridge Eagles have been “encouraged to participate”, with rugby league proposals considered alongside other leisure uses.
What is buried under the pitches
The site is 2.43 hectares and has been a sports ground since 1958. Elmbridge Eagles Rugby League have played there since about 2006, and the club’s trustees held the lease.
In 2013 the club won Sport England funding to improve two rugby pitches, which drained badly on clay. Planning permission followed in October 2016 for upgrading the playing surface, including importing recovered soils. The soil was controlled by an Environment Agency permit issued to a recycling company, which allowed less than 15,348 cubic metres of material.
Work started in July 2018. Residents and councillors raised concerns about what was arriving that November. Work stopped in December 2018 for bad weather and, the report says, never restarted because the assurances officers asked for never came.
By then the council’s report puts the amount imported at about 32,696 cubic metres, roughly 17,348 cubic metres, or 113 per cent, more than the permit allowed. The council’s public announcement describes the same material as approximately 52,000 tonnes.
The report also records that:
- very limited information exists on where much of the material came from, and no reliable account of its history survives
- no continuous sampling or validation was carried out after it was placed on site
- the Environment Agency identified asbestos containing materials in one imported load during its single site visit; that load was rejected, but the report says it cannot be confirmed that other loads did not contain any
- neither the Environment Agency permit nor the contaminated land planning condition has been discharged
- because there is no permit covering the material, all of it is now classed as waste that is “effectively there illegally”
A 2026 geo-environmental report by RSK Geosciences found no chemical contaminants posing a significant risk to site users. More than 60 investigation locations were sampled and one isolated sample of cement bound asbestos was found. The council says the risk to end users is low, and that the material would meet the chemical requirements for a sports pitch, though any new facility would need new surfacing.
The Environment Agency has told the council it is treating the site as abandoned, and that the material is unlikely to cause environmental harm if left where it is. A permit would probably be needed to cap or remove it.
The money the press release leaves out
The council has two quotes for remediation. Removing the soil down to the level originally permitted might cost around £0.85 million. Both quotes ran up to £1.7 million, and the report treats that higher figure as the council’s financial risk if the Environment Agency ever enforces against it as landowner.
The council has already spent on getting to this point:
| Project cost | Amount |
|---|---|
| Commercial advice | £16,000 |
| Legal advice | £25,000 |
| Environmental consultants | £13,470 |
| Other marketing and project costs | £4,650 |
| Total | £59,120 |
Two other things are in the papers and not in the announcement. The council served a forfeiture notice on the original trustees in November 2025, then completed a Deed of Surrender instead, taking the land back with vacant possession at the end of June 2026. And it had sent a letter before action to a waste company in November 2025 over the unauthorised deposits, but dropped that because the company has since gone into liquidation and pursuing it is no longer considered a prudent use of council money.
The council is explicit that it will not pay for the clean-up. It intends to sell the freehold to a leisure operator who will fund it, and the bidding guidelines tell bidders that requests for council money towards remediation are “unlikely to be considered”.
Rugby league is not guaranteed a place
Officers have met Elmbridge Eagles and offered help through the Rugby Football League to put a bid together. But the report is direct about the limits of that: the evaluation of bidders will not require a condition for rugby league to be played on the site, because adding one would restrict the field of bidders.
The report describes the club as strategically important, one of the few rugby league clubs in the south east, running teams from under 7s to 16-plus including disability and girls’ teams.
Padel is named as a likely use, with a warning attached
Officers write that padel has been suggested for the site, either alone or alongside a playing field, and that a fast-growing sport short of courts may find the location attractive.
They then set out what would have to be weighed: noise from play, which they describe as distinctive and repetitive, extended hours of use, lighting, more comings and goings, the look of courts, fencing and lighting columns, and parking, ecology and drainage.
Green Belt, and why it is not grey belt
The site is Green Belt, with the northern part in flood zones 1 and 2. Surrey’s 2018 assessment scored this land 5 out of 5 for preventing neighbouring towns merging, and described it as playing a critical role in keeping Esher, Claygate and Greater London visually and physically separate.
That score matters. Under the 2026 National Planning Policy Framework, land can be treated as “grey belt”, and built on more readily, only if it does not strongly contribute to certain Green Belt purposes. Because this site scores strongly on that purpose, officers say it does not meet the grey belt definition. A housing bid would be unlikely to get permission, and the report says the council would not be obliged to accept a high bid that depended on one.
The public footpath across the land, reference UB107/29/10, stays either way.
What it means for you
The decision is Wednesday, and the timetable after it is short because Elmbridge Borough Council ceases to exist on 1 April 2027, when it becomes part of East Surrey Council.
- 16 September 2026: Cabinet agreed to market the site. Done
- Autumn 2026: marketing, including adverts in Estates Gazette and a microsite for bidders
- 14 October 2026: an informal information meeting for interested parties, which the report suggested could let sports clubs team up on a joint bid. Cancelled on 1 October in favour of a published information pack
- December 2026: shortlisted bidders present to an informal member steering group, advised by Active Surrey
- January 2027: the council may be able to decide. If the price exceeds £100,000, East Surrey Council must approve it too
- 1 April 2027: East Surrey Council takes over, and with it the enforcement decisions on this site
If you live near Oaken Lane, the practical question is what arrives after the lorries: the council has flagged padel noise and lighting itself, and any scheme will need planning permission, at which point there is a formal chance to comment. Planning applications in the borough are tracked on our Elmbridge planning news page.
One small oddity survives in the papers. Appendix B, the bidding guidelines published with the agenda before the meeting, already stated that the council “at its Cabinet Meeting on 16 September 2026 agreed that it would not fund remediation of the site”. Cabinet has now met, so the sentence is accurate; it was written in the past tense a week early.
The council says an engagement and communications plan will keep residents informed of the marketing process and the decision points.
Sources
- Elmbridge Borough Council, Cabinet, 16 September 2026, item 4: Disposal of land in Oaken Lane, Claygate, Esher for the site area, the history, the permitted and imported soil volumes, the asbestos findings, the remediation quotes, the £59,120 project costs, the Deed of Surrender, the dropped letter before action, the Green Belt and grey belt assessment, the padel comments, the rugby league condition and the timeline.
- Appendix B, proposed bidding guidelines for the five bid criteria and the statement that bids seeking council money for remediation are unlikely to be considered.
- Elmbridge Borough Council, Cabinet agenda, 16 September 2026 for the meeting date, time and item order.
- Elmbridge Borough Council news: taking steps to secure a long-term future for Oaken Lane site, updated 1 October 2026 for the appointment of Lambert Smith Hampton and the cancelled information session.
- Lambert Smith Hampton listing on Rightmove, checked 2 October 2026, for the price on application, the 7.56 acres across two freehold titles and the clubhouse description.
- Elmbridge Borough Council news: taking steps to secure a long-term future for Oaken Lane site, published 8 September 2026 and reissued on 17 September, for the council’s public account, the 52,000 tonnes figure, the confirmation that Cabinet agreed to market the site and the portfolio holder’s comments.
Update, 18 September 2026: this article was published on 14 September as a preview of the Cabinet meeting. It has been updated to record that Cabinet met on 16 September and agreed to market the site. The minutes are not yet published.
Update, 2 October 2026: added the marketing launch through Lambert Smith Hampton, the price on application, the listing’s site area and the cancellation of the 14 October bidders’ meeting.
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