IKEA has failed to win High Court backing for its proposed 300,000 sq ft (28,000 sq m) store in Stockport.
Mr Justice Elias has thrown out a challenge by IKEA to deputy prime minister John Prescott’s refusal of planning permission for the £30m superstore in Tiviot Way.
The judge dismissed allegations that Prescott’s August decision had been “inadequate” and had contained “a number of mistakes”.
“I consider the decision to be less than satisfactory in certain respects, but I do not think that the challenges mounted by IKEA demonstrate errors such as require me to quash the decision,” he said.
The ruling marks the end of the Swedish retailer’s second legal challenge to decisions by Prescott on the viability of the Stockport store. In February 2003, the High Court quashed an earlier refusal of planning permission with Prescott’s consent.
Mr Justice Elias today said that the first secretary of state had been “fully entitled” to conclude that the scale of the store on the 5.17ha former industrial site was too large for a sub-regional centre such as Stockport.
The judge backed Prescott’s findings that, because the catchment area for the store would extend beyond the Stockport region, IKEA’s analysis of appropriate sites should have also considered sites that could serve the wider area.
The fact that IKEA planned to build new stores in Sheffield, North Manchester and North Liverpool, and to extend its Warrington and Leeds stores, would have only a “very marginal effect” on the catchment area from which customers of the Stockport store would be drawn, he said.
Ikea currently has 182 stores operating in 23 countries, with an additional 22 franchise stores in 14 countries. It hopes to open 19 new stores in 2005.
References: EGi News 21/02/05
