Respondents granting outline permission subject to conditions – Applicant seeking to quash grant of permission – Whether respondents failing to take material considerations into account – Application dismissed
In September 1997 the respondent council granted outline planning permission, in accordance with an earlier resolution of their planning committee in December 1996, for residential development and public open space at Radyr Farm, Cardiff. The outline permission contained a number of conditions, inter alia, condition 6, which stated that development should not commence until access improvements were complete, and no dwelling was to be occupied until two further sets of highway work were undertaken. In order to achieve the second set, two small areas of land needed to be acquired. Circular 35/95 para 40 contained advice in respect of such conditions, namely that a negative condition should not be imposed unless there were a reasonable prospect of the action in question being performed within the time-span of the permission. The applicant sought judicial review of the respondents’ resolution to grant outline permission in September 1997 on the ground that the respondents had failed to take a material consideration, namely the advice in Circular 35/95, into account. The respondents submitted that the advice had been considered by the council’s officers, who, in the exercise of their discretion, had concluded that it did not need to be put before the planning committee when they made their earlier resolution in 1996.
Held: The application was dismissed.
There was no suggestion that there would be a problem acquiring the two areas of land. Furthermore, there was nothing to prevent permission being implemented and nothing to suggest delay. Condition 6 provided considerable flexibility. The officers were entitled to conclude that the advice in the Circular did not need to be put before the planning committee in December 1996. There was no real possibility that the committee would have reached a different conclusion had they had such advice. The respondents had not failed to take a material consideration into account.
Timothy Straker QC and Richard Ground (instructed by Sharpe Pritchard) appeared for the applicant; Harriet Murray (instructed by the solicitor to Cardiff County Council) appeared for the respondents.
Sarah Addenbrooke, barrister
