When statute lays down a timetable, the usual concern is not to miss a deadline. The lesson to be learned from Enterprise Inns plc v Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions [2000] 4 PLR 52 is that it can, on occasions, be just as dangerous to jump the gun.
On learning that a CPO affecting its public house had been confirmed by the Secretary of State, the applicant, believing that it had good grounds for challenge, lost no time in applying to the court under section 23 of the Acquisition of Land Act 1981. Publication of the relevant decision took place three days later. The defendant Secretary of State, claiming that the court had no jurisdiction to hear the application, pointed to subsection (4), which requires that such applications should be made “within six weeks… from the date on which notice of the confirmation… is first published in accordance with this Act”. The judge agreed, holding that the Act had clearly prescribed a six-week “window”. Since publication had been deliberately chosen as the trigger, it could not be contended that the Act was concerned solely with an “end date”.
When statute lays down a timetable, the usual concern is not to miss a deadline. The lesson to be learned from Enterprise Inns plc v Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions [2000] 4 PLR 52 is that it can, on occasions, be just as dangerous to jump the gun.
On learning that a CPO affecting its public house had been confirmed by the Secretary of State, the applicant, believing that it had good grounds for challenge, lost no time in applying to the court under section 23 of the Acquisition of Land Act 1981. Publication of the relevant decision took place three days later. The defendant Secretary of State, claiming that the court had no jurisdiction to hear the application, pointed to subsection (4), which requires that such applications should be made “within six weeks… from the date on which notice of the confirmation… is first published in accordance with this Act”. The judge agreed, holding that the Act had clearly prescribed a six-week “window”. Since publication had been deliberately chosen as the trigger, it could not be contended that the Act was concerned solely with an “end date”.
