National park — Planning permission for holiday village — Whether planning authority entitled to take local economic benefits into account as outweighing conflict with development plan — Whether bias on part of authority members — Claim dismissed
The defendant authority granted outline planning permission for the construction of a holiday village in Pembrokeshire national park that was contrary to the local plan policy. The claimant brought judicial review proceedings, contending that the defendants had breached the requirements of section 54A of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990 by following a flawed decision-making process, and by taking account of the benefit of the development to the local economy as a reason for not acting in accordance with the development plan. The local plan set out five criteria for development proposals, one of which established that any proposal should contribute to an overriding national need. The claimant submitted that if the development did not meet this need, the local economic benefit could not be relied upon as a material consideration in the authority’s decision. The claimant argued that a consideration that had been properly taken into account within the terms of a policy could not then come back into play as a material consideration justifying a decision not to give effect to that policy.
The claimant also alleged bias on the part of two members of the authority who: (i) had voted in favour of granting permission; (ii) were also members of the county council; (iii) had approved a loan by the council to the developer; and (iv) had supported the planning application throughout. The claimant submitted that the two members had approached the decision with closed minds and had not displayed an impartial consideration of all the relevant issues.
Held: The claim was dismissed.
The authority had identified and considered the relevant considerations, and had clearly taken the view that the economic benefits of the development outweighed the contrary considerations contained in the development plan. That decision had been reached by a process that was fully in accordance with the law. The local economic benefit that the development might bring by way of employment was a material consideration that the authority were entitled to take into account in deciding whether the development plan should be followed. Even if the economic case were considered insufficient under the terms of the local plan policy because it was not a national need, the local economic case would remain a material consideration, and the authority were entitled to consider whether the economic advantages of the development none the less justified the development in the circumstances: City of Edinburgh Council v Secretary of State for Scotland [1997] 3 PLR 71 applied; Buckland v Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions [2001] EWHC 524 (Admin); [2001] 4 PLR 34 distinguished.
The matters relied upon by the claimant would not suggest to the fair-minded and informed observer that there was a real possibility of bias on the part of the two authority members. The evidence did not show that they had closed their minds. Their approach to the planning issue was concerned with the merits. A distinction could be made between a closed mind and a legitimate predisposition towards a particular point of view, although that might be difficult to apply in practice. The court could do no more than look to see whether the member or members had given proper consideration to the planning merits, and that had been followed in this case: Bovis Homes Ltd v New Forest District Council; Alfred McAlpine Developments Ltd v Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions [2002] EWHC 483 (Admin) applied.
David Wolfe (instructed by Leigh Day & Co) appeared for the claimant; Patrick Clarkson QC and Katherine Olley (instructed by Sharpe Pritchard) appeared for the defendants; John Steel QC and Andrew Tabachnik (instructed by Clarke Willmott & Clarke, of Bristol) appeared for the developer as an interested party; Nicholas Cooke QC (instructed by the solicitor to Pembrokeshire County Council) appeared for the county council as an interested party.
Sally Dobson, barrister
