Spelthorne council has failed in a High Court challenge to the Environment Secretary’s decision that its plans for affordable housing in the area should be watered down.
The council sought to bring in a policy which stipulated that provision for affordable housing should be made in all housing developments of more than 0.1ha (0.25 acres) in its area.
However, in the direction challenged by the council, the Secretary of State refused to depart from planning circular requirements. These indicate that the threshold should be 1ha (0.25 acres), although councils have the scope to adopt a lower threshold of between 0.5ha (1.24 acres) and 1ha (2.47 acres) where local circumstances merit it.
Spelthorne argued that it was entitled to set the 0.1ha (0.25-acre) threshold on the basis it was justified for the area if the affordable housing quotas that are required by the year 2006 were to be achieved.
The council argued that the Secretary of State was, in ruling that the Council had set too low a threshold, wrong to take the view that the council had failed to make out a strong enough case for special treatment.
In his decision the Secretary of State took the view that the council, in seeking to set the lower threshold, had failed to take into account the impact on the affordable housing pool of other factors such as vacant housing units and conversion to multiple residential use larger houses and offices.
Rejecting the councils challenge, Judge Harrison said he did not consider that the decision under challenge had been unreasonable and, on the evidence before him, the Secretary of State had been entitled to take the view that there was no special case to justify lowering the threshold below 0.5ha (1.24 acres).
He said the Secretary of State had clearly considered whether local circumstances justified a departure from the guidance and concluded that it did not. His reasons could not be said to be ambiguous or unintelligible.
EGi News 23/11/00
