Planning application – Objections – Procedural flaw – Defendant council granting planning permission for extension to property – Planning committee refusing claimant objector opportunity to address committee — Claimant seeking to quash decision on basis that decision-making process procedurally flawed – Whether planning committee erring in failing to take account of objections and depriving claimant opportunity to speak — Whether procedural flaws causing prejudice to claimant – Application granted
The claimant lived in a residential area opposite two semi-detached two-storey properties, one of which was in single residential occupation. However, the ground floor of the adjoining property had been converted into an Islamic community centre. The interested party applied to the defendant council for planning permission for a two-storey extension to the community centre. The claimant objected on the basis that the development would intensify the use of the centre, and thus result in increased noise and disturbance to the neighbours.
He argued that the planning history of the building indicated that the interested party had failed to adhere to planning conditions imposed on the grant of earlier permissions and had failed to produce a management, plan as required by a previous planning consent.
The defendants’ planning officer accepted those objections and recommended that the permission should be refused but his report did not refer to them. It focused on the size and scale of the proposed development. The claimant submitted written representations to the planning committee but was not allowed to speak at the meeting. However, the committee allowed a supporter of the application to speak in the mistaken belief that she was speaking on behalf of local residents. In those circumstances, the defendants granted the permission.
The claimant applied for judicial review of that decision, contending that the planning permission should be set aside on the ground that the decision-making process had been tainted by significant procedural errors that were unfair and prejudicial to him. The defendants argued that, even though the committee had erred in preventing the claimant from speaking at the meeting, that error had prejudiced him.
Held: The application was granted.
The question of whether the actions of a local planning authority involved any procedural unfairness was connected with the question of whether the claimant had been prejudiced. In the absence of some prejudice, no procedural unfairness arose because there was no such concept as a technical breach of natural justice. The claimant had to show that he was, in principle, entitled to make representations before a decision against him was taken. However, he also had to show that, if admitted to state his case, he had a case of substance to make: R (on the application of Midcounties Co-operative Ltd) v Wyre Forest District Council [2009] EWHC 964 (Admin); [2009] PLSCS 222 considered.
In the instant case, the planning officer’s report was incomplete. It made little, if any, reference to the applicant’s breaches of two previous planning permissions with respect to the non-production of a management plan and the disregard of the restrictions on the number of users, hours of use and confining of the centre’s use to those who were locally based and who travelled to the centre on foot. Furthermore, it made little reference to the need to consider deferring any grant of planning permission until a management plan had been agreed to ensure compliance with, and long-term monitoring of, the centre’s use.
The committee had deprived the claimant of the opportunity to address it by taking account of matters that it should not have done, particularly that the claimant would be confined to matters contained in his written representations should he be allowed to speak, that the case for local residents had already been provided by their representative who had addressed the committee and that anything relevant that he wanted to say had already been placed before them by his representations and the planning officer’s report.
The committee allowed one oral representation to be made by someone who was not entitled to speak and who was advocating for the applicant’s case although she was erroneously thought to be putting the case for local residents. The committee did not consider or address the claimant’s objections relating to the previous history of breaches, the inevitable further intensification of that misuse once the extension to the premises had been completed, the failure to produce or comply with a management plan and the need to defer granting planning permission until such a management plan had been agreed.
In the light of those failures, the claimant had been seriously prejudiced in being prevented from addressing the committee. The value of a brief oral summary of cogent objections immediately before a planning committee deliberated on the merits of an application was considerable and the claimant would have had an opportunity to address the issues that had not been placed before the committee by the planning officer and those raised in the oral presentation by the proposal’s supporter. Had he been allowed to speak, the claimant would have had an opportunity to discuss the matters relating to previous misuse of the premises, the likely future misuse and the unlikelihood of a management plan condition achieving its purpose. Furthermore, he could have urged the committee to defer granting planning permission before it had a management plan, which had not been considered by the committee.
Accordingly, the committee had reached its decision in a flawed procedural manner, which caused the claimant significant prejudice so that its decision would be quashed and set aside.
The claimant appeared in person; Hugh Richards (instructed by the legal department of Cambridge City Council) appeared for the defendants.
Eileen O’Grady, barrister
