Toby Carvery will pay to restore an orchard in Enfield after its parent company settled a legal dispute over the unauthorised partial felling of a 500-year-old oak tree in Whitewebbs Park, north London.
Mitchells & Butlers Retail (M&B), which runs the restaurant chain, announced on Wednesday that it had reached an agreement with Enfield Council, the landowner. The undisclosed financial settlement will fund the replanting of a community orchard in the borough’s Ridgeway corridor as part of the council’s Enfield Chase landscape restoration scheme — described as London’s largest woodland and nature restoration initiative, covering up to 1,000 hectares of former farmland. M&B will also pay for the planting of 1,000 trees near the orchard, cover the council’s legal costs, and fund treatment of the oak’s remains, which experts believe have little hope of survival.
In a joint statement, M&B said it “sincerely apologises for the upset this has caused”. The statement added: “Enfield council recognises that M&B acted on the recommendation of reputable, professional advisers in taking the steps that it did, for the purpose of mitigating any health and safety risk to guests, team members and the wider public arising from the condition of the tree.” The parties said they now consider the matter closed.
The felling and the dispute over the tree’s condition
The chain of events began in April last year, when contractors took a chainsaw to the ancient oak, which stood next to the Toby Carvery car park. The tree, known locally as the “Guy Fawkes Oak”, was estimated to be 500 years old and was considered of significant ecological value. The Woodland Trust said it was “ecologically much more significant than the Sycamore Gap” tree.
The work was carried out by Ground Control, a maintenance and biodiversity services company based in Billericay, Essex. Documents seen by The Guardian suggest Ground Control agreed to remove the tree for M&B citing a large split in one of its main branches. However, sources claimed the work was led by Ground Control’s grounds maintenance team, which has less expertise on trees than its specialist arborist team. Ground Control declined to comment at the time due to ongoing legal proceedings.
M&B has always maintained that the felling was necessary for safety reasons because the oak was dying — a claim disputed by numerous tree experts. A Forestry Commission investigation conducted in late 2025 found green shoots on the remaining wood, concluding that the tree was still alive at the time it was cut. Russell Miller, an ancient tree expert and member of the campaign group Guardian of Whitewebbs, said the tree could have lived for another century or more and described the felling as “the worst example I’ve ever seen of inappropriate tree surgery”.
Enfield Council initiated eviction proceedings against M&B over what it called “a reckless act which caused huge damage to the tree and cut its expected lifespan”. It also served a Section 146 notice for serious breaches of the lease and began forfeiture proceedings in Edmonton County Court. The council referred the matter to the Metropolitan Police as potential criminal damage, but the force dropped its investigation, stating it was a civil matter and there was “no evidence of criminality”.
Links to Tottenham Hotspur and the Whitewebbs Park development
M&B is majority-owned by the investment company Enic, which has strong financial links to Tottenham Hotspur Football Club. In its 2024 annual accounts, M&B disclosed that it had entered into an option arrangement with Spurs to buy the lease on the Toby Carvery site from Enfield Council. Enic Group is ultimately controlled by the Joe Lewis Family Trust and, as of October 2025, held 87.62% of the club. In a separate development, it was reported in June 2026 that Eight Sports Capital had agreed to acquire a 24.99% stake in Enic Sports and Developments Holdings Limited from Daniel Levy’s family trusts.
Tottenham Hotspur has denied any connection between the felling of the ancient oak and its plans to build a women’s football training academy on 17 hectares of adjacent land in Whitewebbs Park. The proposed development, which includes 11 pitches, floodlights and a turf academy, would sit on a former golf course and operate under a 25-year lease from Enfield Council for £2 million. The club has argued that the development would “improve local access to nature and habitats, and provide new facilities for visitors, community groups, and sports clubs”, and that it would preserve open public access to more than 80% of the park.
Opposition to the Spurs plans has been led by the campaign group Guardian of Whitewebbs, which successfully crowdfunded significant sums to fund legal challenges. In February 2026, the group was granted permission for a judicial review against Enfield Council’s decision to grant planning permission for the academy. The grounds include claims that the council breached the Local Government Act 1972, misled its planning committee on biodiversity net gain, failed to properly assess the impact on the Green Belt, and that the decision was tainted by apparent bias. The case was expected to be heard this month. Oscar-winning actress Dame Judi Dench has also publicly opposed the development.
Russell Miller, the ancient tree expert, said of the settlement over the oak felling: “It’s very disappointing that Enfield council have chosen to settle on the basis of an implausible story about tree risk being a motivation for the felling, given all the irregularities that were involved.”
