Dispute to save Lancaster brewery moves to Court of Appeal

Save Britain’s Heritage (SAVE) has renewed its attempt to save Lancaster’s historic Mitchell’s Brewery from demolition, arguing that a recent Court of Justice (CJ) ruling means that its appeal against the council’s stance should be allowed. SAVE is appealing against the High Court rejection of its claim that the long-vacant brewery could not be demolished without a formal grant of planning permission and an environmental impact assessment (EIA). In May 2002, Judge Pelling ruled that the proposal did not meet European rules on EIAs. However, SAVE argues that following the CJ’s ruling on 3 March in European Commission v Ireland C-50/09, the Court of Appeal should allow its appeal and quash Lancaster City Council’s decision that the proposed demolition does not constitute “development” and does not therefore require prior planning approval. The Court of Appeal has reserved its decision on the effect of that and will give judgment at a later date. SAVE contends that the CJ ruled that the Irish government had wrongly excluded almost all demolition works from the requirement for planning consent and, in doing so, had failed to meet its obligations under the Environmental Impact Assessment Directive 85/337/EEC. The ruling means, it says, that demolition can constitute a development “project” under the directive and requires planning permission and an EIA. It also seeks a declaration that paras 2(a) to 2(d) of the Town and Country Planning (Demolition – Description of Buildings) Directions 1995 are unlawful and should not be given effect. However, the government argues that the CJ’s reasoning was “demonstrably erroneous”, and even if correct, could not apply to this case. It contends that the CJ had erred in moving from the proposition that, on a particular set of facts, demolition could be characterised as an “intervention in the natural surroundings and landscape”; therefore triggering the directive, to the proposition that demolition can automatically be so classified. In October 2009, Mitchell’s of Lancaster (Brewers) served the council with a notice of intended demolition, claiming that the buildings were of no practical use and that it was not financially viable to refurbish them. Following council approval, work started on 2 December, but, a day later, SAVE obtained an injunction preventing the demolition.