Town and country planning – Planning permission – Metropolitan open land – Claimant applying for judicial review of the decision of the defendant local authority to grant to the interested party football club planning permission for training facility and associated development – Whether planning officer’s report wrongly concluding that benefits of proposal outweighing harm to green belt – Application dismissed
The defendant local authority granted the interested party planning permission for a training facility and associated development for Queen’s Park Rangers Football Club on a site know as Warren Farm, near Hanwell, west London. The 24.8-hectare site was in an area of metropolitan open land (MOL) within the green belt and had previously been used as a sports club. The proposed development involved the demolition of existing buildings and the redevelopment of the site to provide a first team training and academy facility comprising a number of buildings, including community facilities, together with car parking, flood lighting and landscaping. The claimant represented a group which objected to the development, expressing concerns about the status of the site as MOL and the implications of the proposal both in relation to the strictures of MOL policy and the use of the land for recreational purposes by the public.
The defendants’ planning officers prepared a report which concluded that the improvement to existing facilities, in conjunction with the availability of other open space areas in the general vicinity of the application site, outweighed the direct impact of the “loss” of public access to part of the development site. In terms of noise, there would be little change to the previous situation at the site as a sports club and the proposed lighting and floodlighting complied with the guidance on mitigation design measures to minimise light pollution. Overall, there were very special circumstances sufficient to outweigh any harm to the green belt, including the compelling need for the development, lack of alternative brownfield sites, benefits to the local community and the proposed steps to mitigate any harm to the openness of the MOL. The defendants subsequently accepted the recommendation in the report and granted planning permission.
The claimant applied for judicial review. She contended that the report had significantly misled the planning committee by failing properly to advise them in relation to the correct approach to assessment of the MOL issues. In particular, the report’s conclusions had been structured in such a way that there were elements of non-MOL harm, namely public access, noise and lighting, which were not taken into account and weighed against the benefits when the conclusion as to the existence of very special circumstances was reached.
Held: The application was dismissed.
(1) It was incumbent on the decision-maker, having concluded that development was inappropriate, in green belt or MOL, to identify the harm (including harm by virtue of inappropriateness in and of itself) and then weigh that harm together with any non-green belt or non-MOL planning harm against the benefits relied upon it see whether or not very special circumstances justifying the development had been made out: Redhill Aerodrome Ltd v Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government [2014] EWCA Civ 1386; 2015 EGLR 33 applied.
Paragraph 88 of the National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF) stated that very special circumstances would not exist unless the potential harm to the green belt (MOL in this case) by reason of inappropriateness, and any other harm, was clearly outweighed by other considerations. The words “any other harm” to which reference was made was residual harm in respect of the various material considerations which might be relevant to the decision, after benefits and disbenefits relevant to a material consideration had been weighed and balanced and mitigation taken into account.
(2) In the present case, the defendants and the interested party correctly observed that the was no other residual harm identified by the planning officers in the report. It was clear that a balanced conclusion had been reached that the development was acceptable on the question of public access. Further, the planning officers’ analysis did not show any residual planning harm in respect of noise to be put into the MOL analysis. They obviously identified that there would be noise from the use of the facility but they noted that there would be little change as a consequence of development from the site’s existing use, and other larger events would be infrequent. Turning to lighting and floodlighting, the officers recognised that there would be some impact but noted that detailed assessment which had been provided, in accordance with recognised guidance from the institute of Lighting Professionals, enabled them to reach the conclusion in detailed design terms that flood lighting was not considered to give rise to any detrimental impact on residential amenity. No element of residual harm in relation to lighting and flood lighting was left out of account when the officers struck the balance in relation to MOL issues and concluded that the necessary very special circumstances had been demonstrated. It was clear from the committee report that the officers reached the conclusion, as a matter of planning judgment, that the only harm to be weighed against the benefits of the proposal in applying paragraph 88 of the NPPF was the harm to MOL.
Accordingly, the application for judicial review would be dismissed.
Marc Willers QC and Justine Compton (instructed by Richard Buxton Solicitors) appeared for the claimant;. Stephen Whale (instructed by Ealing London Borough Council) appeared for the defendants; Reuben Taylor QC (instructed by Withers LLP) appeared for the interested party.
Eileen O’Grady, barrister
