Second and third defendants granted permission for extension to dwelling-house – Discrepancies in dimensions – Revised planning application submitted to council – Council refusing permission and issuing enforcement notice – Inspector allowing defendants’ appeal against enforcement notice and granting permission in accordance with revised application – Council challenging inspector’s decision – Whether inspector misunderstood revised application – Application dismissed
In 1997, the second and third defendants, Rajko and Lesley Sotra, were granted planning permission to build an extension to the rear of the ground floor of their dwelling-house. There were, however, discrepancies in the dimensions of the extension, as built, and the approved plan. The second and third defendants submitted a revised planning application to Barnet London Borough Council (the claimant) for the retention of the single storey extension plus modifications to the parapet walls on each side of the flank elevations. The claimant council refused the revised application and issued an enforcement notice, against which the second and third defendants appealed.
In his decision letter, the inspector concluded, inter alia, that the revised proposal would “result in removal of the parapet on each side of the extension and the four or five top-most brick courses”. He went on to conclude that this “would be sufficient to minimise the seriously harmful effect on visual amenity…and to justify granting planning permission for it”. Accordingly, the inspector allowed the appeal and granted conditional permission in accordance with the revised application.
The claimant sought to quash the inspector’s decision pursuant to section 288 of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990, principally on the ground that the inspector had misunderstood the effect of the revised planning application. It was submitted that the inspector misunderstood the amount to be removed from the extension, as the application plans only showed the removal of the parapet walls.
Held: The application was dismissed.
The claimant’s criticism was wrongly based upon a strict construction of one sentence in the decision letter. Reading the decision as a whole, it was clear that the inspector fully understood the effect of the revised application. It was sufficiently clear that what he had in mind was only the removal of the part he saw on a site inspection, namely the top-most part of the structure, which he considered created the harm to the neighbouring amenity.
Matthew Reed (instructed by the solicitor to Barnet London Borough Council) appeared for the claimant; John Hobson QC (instructed by the Treasury Solicitor) appeared for the first defendant; the second and third defendants did not appear and were not represented.
Sarah Addenbrooke
