A gypsy family that has previously argued a planning application up to the Court of Appeal has had its latest claim thrown out by the High Court.
Newman J has backed an inspector’s July 2004 decision refusing to allow John Evans to live in a caravan on a green-belt site close to Wigan with his partner, Catherine Varey, and her three teenage sons.
The judge upheld arguments by the first secretary of state that because the family had had opportunities to relocate to a nearby authorised caravan site, there could be “no certainty” that it would be forced to resort to roadside encampments.
He added that the inspector had correctly balanced all necessary considerations, including the potential hardship on Varey’s youngest son, who attends a special educational needs school less than a mile from the site, and on her horses.
Wigan Metropolitan Borough Council served enforcement and stop notices requiring the family to vacate the site at Martland Mill Lane, after it had moved its caravan onto the land in 1999 in breach of planning controls.
The council subsequently refused Evans’ application for planning permission, a decision that was backed by both the High Court and the Court of Appeal.
In March 2002 and February 2003, the council refused further planning applications, leading to the present proceedings.
Newman J dismissed the latest claims that the inspector, in considering Evans’ appeal last year, should have found “little or no prospect” of the family being able to find alternative accommodation.
The judge heard evidence that more than 30 pitches existed at two nearby sites in Bickershaw Lane and Little Lane, and that Varey and her children had been accommodated at short notice at the Little Lane site for a period in 1999.
He held that the inspector had been “entitled to conclude” that vacancies at the alternative sites in the past indicated that the gypsies would have opportunities to live on those sites in the future, and that the family would not have to seek roadside encampments.
Evans v First Secretary of State and another Administrative Court (Newman J) 24 January 2005.
David Watkinson (instructed by the Community Law Partnership, of Birmingham) appeared for the claimant; Nathalie Lieven (instructed by the Treasury Solicitor) appeared for the first defendant; the second defendants, Wigan Metrolpolitan Borough Council, did not appear and were not represented.
References: EGi Legal News 25/01/05
