A community action group worried about local flooding took its battle to block a Barratt Homes development to the Court of Appeal today.
The Menston Action Group claims the development will exacerbate conditions in an area that is already prone to flooding. It wants to block a decision made by City of Bradford Metropolitan District Council allowing Barratt Homes to build 173 homes on a greenfield site on the edge of the village of Menston, near Bradford.
The campaigners say that the council misinterpreted a condition placed on the planning permission relating to flooding, stating that development cannot begin until an appropriate scheme for surface water drainage is approved.
In a hearing today, the Action Group’s barrister David Wolfe QC said that High Court judge Mrs Justice Patterson had erred in a judgment a year ago.
He told judges at the Court of Appeal that the claim centres on a condition attached to the planning permission relating to surface water drainage.
The condition states: “Development shall not begin until a surface water drainage scheme for water passing though the site, based on sustainable drainage principles has been submitted to and approved by the local planning authority.”
In particular, the phrase “based on sustainable drainage principles” needs to be examined, Woolfe said.
He said that, in the Action Group’s opinion, the requirement for “sustainable drainage principles” means that the scheme needs to consider the potential for reducing the exiting flood risk to the site. His case is that, as the proposed scheme does not do this, it does not fulfil the planning permission conditions.
He said that, although Patterson J disagreed with his argument in the High Court, she did not define the meaning of the phrase.
He said it was hard to see how she could have found against them without giving an opinion on what the condition means.
Menston Action Group v City of Bradford Metropolitan District Council, Court of Appeal, 12 July 2016
