‘They said I could be jailed for two years or fined €12m over a bike shed in my front garden’

Plans to exempt storage units from planning permission are still stuck in Department of Housing purgatory

Siobhán Kelly had to get rid of the family's bikes when they were forced to remove the bike store in their front garden

Caroline O'Doherty

Householders are still in the dark about what kind of bike storage they can have in their front garden a year after several had to remove units under threat of prosecution.

The Department of Housing says it is considering exempting bike storage from planning permission but the process has been going on since last summer and there is no conclusion in sight.