An Oxfordshire town planner has failed in a bid to stop the council from correcting an error on a map that placed a parcel of land he owned outside of the green belt.
Douglas Bond from North Hinksey claims that the council needs to have a proper review, involving “public participation and independent scrutiny” before the Vale of White Horse District Council can correct its mapping error.
As part of their preparations to update the Local Plan, the council had considered taking land outside of North Hinksey out of the green belt. If they had done, a parcel of land owned by Bond behind his house would have been freed up for development.
However, following a 2016 report by a planning inspector, the council decided against making the change. Even so, when the council published its Adopted Policies map, it erroneously marked the North Hinksey land as being outside of the green belt, and when it attempted to correct the mistake, Bond wrote to them challenging its legality.
And when in February the council decided, by a council resolution, to correct the Adopted Policies map, Bond filed a High Court judicial review challenging the decision.
The case was heard last month at the High Court and, in a ruling handing down yesterday, Mrs Justice Lang dismissed his claim.
According to the ruling, Bond argued that the council’s decision to use a resolution as lithe legal method to authorise a correction was unlawful.
He said they were required to use statutory procedures for modifying a development plan, which involved public participation and independent scrutiny.
He also argued that earlier representation made by the council gave him a “legitimate expectation” that the change to the green belt would be made.
However, Lang J ruled that a council resolution was enough to authorise the change “where as a result of an error, the map has been drawn up incorrectly”.
“I do not accept the Claimant’s submission that the only legal power available to the Council to correct the [Adopted Policies map] is by following the statutory procedure for amending a local plan, beginning with the preparation of a submission policies map in accordance with the 2012 Regulations.
As for the ‘legitimate expectation’ argument “I do not consider that the Council’s action in resiling from its representations has resulted in unfairness to him,” she said.
“Alternatively, any unfairness was outweighed by the overriding public interest. Although he has expended time and effort in resisting the Council’s efforts to correct the… map, this has turned out to be misguided.
“For the reasons set out above, the claim is dismissed.”
Douglas Bond v Vale of White Horse District Council
Planning Court (Lang J) 19 November 2019
Michael Bedford QC (instructed by BDB Pitmans LLP) for the Claimant. Craig Howell Williams QC and Caroline Daly (instructed by Sharpe Pritchard LLP) for the Defendant
