A NEW Forest mushroom picker has won her long fight for the right to pick the fungi.

After a four-year legal battle, the Forestry Commission has conceded that Brigitte Tee-Hillman does have the right to carry on harvesting and selling the mushrooms as she has done for some 30 years.

Mrs Tee-Hillman, 64, was arrested in the Forest in November 2002 for stealing wild mushrooms.

The criminal case was thrown out by a judge in May and now the commission has backed down from defending a civil action.

Mrs Tee-Hillman, of Sway Road, Lymington, has been granted a licence for her personally, to pick mushrooms in whatever quantities during her lifetime.

It is believed to be the first time such a licence has been granted in Britain.

Her solicitor Clive Sutton said: "We would have agreed to this right from day one. Mrs Tee-Hillman has been granted everything she personally wants. It is a tremendous victory for the rights of the individual."

German-born Mrs Tee-Hillman, who runs Mrs Tee's Wild Mushrooms business in Lymington, told the Daily Echo: "I'm highly delighted. Some things are worth fighting for. I have been worrying about it for four years. But in the end justice has been done."

The legal costs of the criminal case have been estimated at a high six-figure sum. In May, Judge John Boggis ordered the commission to pay them.

In a statement, Mike Seddon, the deputy surveyor for the commission, said: "Mrs Tee-Hillman has withdrawn her claim against the Forestry Commission having come to an amicable settlement in which she has been granted a licence that is personal to her and for the duration of her lifetime only.

"Looking to the future, we will continue to apply the England code of mushroom picking, which enables individuals to collect up to 1.5kg of fungi for personal consumption but which does not support unregulated commercial picking."