The instances in which a local planning authority (LPA) will be inclined to support an attempt to quash a planning permission that it has granted will probably be rare, but it is accepted that a claim for judicial review may be made against an LPA by one of its own members. Indeed, it may be preferable to take this course rather than to contemplate revoking the planning permission under section 97 of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990 and paying compensation.
In R (on the application of Knowles-Fitton) v Craven District Council [2011] EWHC 212 (Admin), the claimant was a member of the LPA. With its support, he asked the court to quash a full planning permission that the LPA had granted for the erection of chalets on the ground that it had been granted in error. The parties accepted that the officer who granted the planning permission had intended to make it subject to a condition that would prohibit use of the chalets as permanent residences. However, by mistake no such condition was attached to the permission.
(Matters were further confused because the court had also been asked to interpret the planning permission to determine how many chalets were permitted and because the claimant had delayed in filing his claim. The claim was rejected for delay, but the comments of the judge on the circumstances in which a planning permission may be quashed in such a case are helpful.)
The judge stated that, as a matter of principle, the court may quash a planning permission if its grant is infected by material error. He referred to the decision of Sullivan J, as he then was, in R (on the application of Gardner) v Harrogate Borough Council [2008] EWHC 2942 (Admin); [2009] JPL 872 in which the LPA had recognised, following a complaint to the Local Government Ombudsman, that a planning permission that it had granted was tainted by apparent bias.
Sullivan J had held that the proper approach for the court was to maintain the integrity of the planning system by quashing the offending planning permission. This it should do unless there were sound reasons for not pursuing that course, such as undue delay or substantial prejudice.
John Martin is a freelance writer
