Applicant granted outline permission for redevelopment of site – Second respondents failing to approve details of reserved matters – Inspector dismissing appeal – Whether inspector reaching decision without evidence – Application allowed
In 1997 Hillingdon London Borough Council (the second respondents) granted the applicant outline planning permission for the redevelopment of a site for “residential and non-food retail uses, including car parking and new access arrangements”. The permission was subject to conditions that required approval of reserved matters by the second respondents. Consequently, the applicant submitted two applications for approval of such matters, which included the siting of the retail development and Sunday and Bank Holiday trading. Within the site, the applicant had proposed a link for customer vehicles, which, at each end, allowed passage to two of the access points of the site (the internal link). By his decision letter of November 1998, the inspector dismissed appeals against, inter alia, the second respondents’ failure to approve details of the reserved matters. The inspector rejected this point on the basis that the omission of the internal link would improve the layout of the site and avoid a substantial increase in traffic. Pursuant to section 288 of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990, the applicant sought to quash the inspector’s decision on the ground that there was no evidence before him at the inquiry to justify such a decision.
Held: The application was allowed.
The inspector had erred in advancing the possibility of omitting the internal link to facilitate an alternative layout for the site. Neither the applicant nor the second respondents had called expert evidence from traffic or highway engineers at the inquiry, as the points of access to the site had been agreed. There was no evidence before the inspector that enabled him to assess whether or not the layout of the site could be improved in the way he had suggested: Ashbridge Investments Ltd v Minister of Housing and Local Government [1965] 1 WLR 1320 applied. The applicant had been denied an opportunity at the inquiry to call evidence and make representations on a factor that had a bearing on the inspector’s decision, and had therefore suffered prejudice.
David Woolley QC (instructed by Lawrence Graham) appeared for the applicant; Timothy Mould (instructed by the Treasury Solicitor) appeared for the first respondent; the second respondents, Hillingdon London Borough Council, did not appear and were not represented.
Sarah Addenbrooke, barrister