A farmer's construction of accommodation for hundreds of cattle without National Park permission, has "horrified and shocked" some members of the local community.

Daniel Harries, of Velindre Farm, St Nicholas, has applied to build 2552sqm of cattle accommodation; 354 sqm of outside yard and a 1.1 acre slurry lagoon in order to expand his dairy herd by 320 cows to 860 animals.

In October national park planners were recommended to refuse the plan on the grounds it "represents an inappropriate and harmful industrial form of development," and due to concerns about the siting and scale of the slurry lagoon.

The recommendation for refusal was narrowly defeated and the application was deferred to this month's meeting (January 21st) pending further information on potential landscaping.

However members of conservation group, Preserve Pencaer, say that construction on the cattle sheds is now nearing completion.

"People are horrified and shocked at the arrogance of it all," said Brian Jackson on behalf of the group.

"They have gone ahead and constructed the buildings without planning permission. They have taken the opportunity to do it over the Christmas holidays when they knew the parks weren't going to be there. I think they think they can get away with anything and ignore the rules.

"This development is against the principles of the park and is not appropriate. Either the park stands for something or it doesn't."

Farmer Daniel Harries said that he had had to go ahead with the building for animal welfare reasons.

"They have eight weeks to make a decision and the planning went in in May," he said. "It has left us no option. We can't leave our cattle out in this weather."

Mr Harries added that the National Park knew that the building work was going to start, and that he had the support of around 95% of his neighbours.

He denied that building work had taken place over Christmas, saying it had started before Christmas and that the builders returned in the new year.

A National Park Authority spokesman said:

"A National Park Authority enforcement officer visited the site on January 5th 2015 and confirmed that work to erect the cattle accommodation building had commenced.

"The landowner/applicant was advised that any work carried out without the benefit of planning permission was carried out at his own risk and that should permission be refused, he would be responsible for carrying out the necessary remedial works to remedy the breach of planning control.

"The authority will not be taking any further action until the planning application has been determined by the Development Management Committee on January 21st."