Toby Carvery to pay for orchard planting after causing outrage by felling 500-year-old oak

Enfield council in north London took legal action against restaurant chain after outrage over damage to tree

The UK restaurant chain Toby Carvery has settled a legal dispute over taking a chainsaw to an ancient oak tree without permission, by agreeing to pay to restore a lost orchard.

The unauthorised partial felling of the 500-year-old oak next to a Toby Carvery car park in Whitewebbs Park, Enfield, north London, in April last year, prompted widespread public outrage and questions in parliament .

Earlier this year Enfield council, which owns the land, started eviction proceedings against the restaurant chain over what it described as “a reckless act which caused huge damage to the tree and cut its expected lifespan”.

But on Wednesday, Mitchells & Butler Retail (M&B), which runs Toby Carvery, announced it had settled the dispute after agreeing to pay for the replanting of an orchard in the borough and the council’s legal costs.

The company also agreed to pay for treatment of the remains of the oak, which experts say has little hope of surviving owing to the damage done by M&B’s contractors.

In April, the Guardian revealed that the work was done by Ground Control , based in Billericay, Essex, which describes itself as “a leading maintenance business and biodiversity expert”.

In joint statement as part of the settlement M&B said it “sincerely apologises for the upset this [the felling] has caused”.