TRAVELLERS have moved onto the grounds of a church forcing charity event organisers and an engaged couple to rethink their plans.
Travellers swept into the grounds of St John's Church in West Wickham at the beginning of last month and are still refusing to move.
Kelly Clarke is now on the verge of cancelling her dream wedding to fiance Jason Dunn on September 13.
Miss Clarke said: "We are both devastated by this. We wanted a perfect day just like everybody else but with these people here we can't have that.
"If we cancel we stand to lose a considerable amount of money.
"A lot of planning has gone into this wedding and I wouldn't feel right inviting guests with these kind of people nearby."
The travellers decision to move into the church grounds in Layhams Road also forced Emma Biederman to postpone her multi-million pound Dream Rides charity event.
The event was scheduled to run on Saturday (August 30) to help raise money for Great Ormond Street Hospital after Mrs Biederman's five-year-old daughter Molly died of cancer in 2006.
Mrs Biederman said: "We felt that for health and safety reasons we had to postpone the event.
"On the day there would have been £4million of classic cars on site, all of them have been donated to us for the day and we did want to risk damaging the vehicles.
"I am not angry with the travellers, I am angry at the current legislation."
Honorary Curate at the church Ken Gaved says that members of the congregation are unhappy at the travellers' presence.
He said: "There must be 20 vans of one sort or another on the site.
"We will be more than pleased when they move on and hope measures will be taken to stop them coming back."
The Diocese of Southwark own the land and have already begun legal proceedings against the encampment.
Canon Martin Lee from the diocese added: "The travellers were not invited and we have taken legal steps to return the situation to normal."
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