British couple whose house was demolished in Spain launch compensation bid "It's our last hope but we've been warned it would be a ground breaking case," she said. The Spanish authorities hope that we will give up and just go home. But this is our home. We have nowhere else to go to. I do wonder how many years I have left to live and it's so upsetting to think that they will probably be spent fighting on. But we won't give up. We can't. For close to five years the couple and a collection of rescued dogs have been living on the site where once stood the beautiful £300,000 two-storey villa built to their own design and named "Tranquilidad" in the expectation that tranquillity would be the manner in which they spent their retirement. The rubble has long been cleared and they have converted the garage and workshop that once adjoined the house into a cosy dwelling. A shed serves as a lavatory and bathroom and a small generator provides power as they have no mains electricity and water connection. But it is a far cry from the life the couple, he a retired motor mechanic and she a former telecommunications worker, envisioned when they moved to Spain nine years ago after selling the family home in Wokingham, Berkshire. "We thought this would be a place that our children and grandchildren would spend their holidays, where we could spend a really lovely retirement after working hard all our lives," explains Mrs Prior. For three years that's exactly how it was, idyllic. The couple spent tens of thousands of pounds and many hours creating a beautifully landscaped and planted garden transforming the agricultural scrubland on their 107,000 sq ft plot. Then the nightmare started when in January 2008 Mr Prior looked up from washing the dishes to see a bulldozer approaching the gate. I can honestly say that that they [Andalusia government]have wrecked our lives. They have taken everything we worked for away from us, 45 years of working hard and now we have nothing. The Priors, who have three children, six grandchildren and a 15-month old great-grandson, have already accumulated legal bills of more than 150,000 euros in their fight for compensation and a licence to rebuild their home. It's incredibly frustrating. We spent a year waiting for a judge to rule on whether it was the town council of Vera or the regional government of Andalusia who were liable to compensate us but in the end he said he didn't have jurisdiction to decide so the process continues," said Mrs Prior. They have been advised that the legal process could go on for years and that even if compensation is eventually awarded, the authorities, on the brink of bankruptcy as the economic crisis deepens, may be unable to pay it.