Planning permission — Agricultural land — Special landscape area — Defendant setting up wooden shed on wheels — Claimant council applying for injunctive relief — Whether setting up of shed constituting development — Claim dismissed
The claimant council, as the local planning authority, sought an injunction against the first defendant under section 187B of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990 in order to restrain breaches of planning control. These involved the illegal stationing of caravans, the illegal storage of vehicles and the unauthorised parking of chassis with timber building sections on the basis that they caused serious harm to the character and appearance of an attractive area of landscape that had been designated a special landscape area. At trial, the sole matter of dispute concerned the status in law of: (i) a wooden structure, which had been substantially constructed off-site and towed, in two sections, to the location on its own wheels; and (ii) a number of unbuilt sheds, lying on their chassis, that had been brought onto the land (the mobile sheds).
An interim injunction had been granted against the first defendant restraining him from bringing any additional mobile homes or caravans onto the land and from allowing residential use save for one caravan, which was occupied by the second defendant and her children. No relief was being sought against the second defendant.
The claimants contended that: (i) the shed should be removed, since no planning permission in respect of this had been granted; and (ii) its erection constituted “development” within the definition in section 55(1) of the 1990 Act, since it amounted to “the carrying out of… other operations… on… land” for which permission was required. Moreover, the unbuilt sheds constituted development because they involved “the making of [a] material change of use of… land” since use of the land was being changed from agricultural use to use for storage.
Held: The claim was dismissed.
The mobile shed was not a building and the assembling of its two halves did not constitute a building operation and could not therefore be deemed to be development. The shed was not attached to the land and could be moved freely: Skerritts of Nottingham Ltd v Secretary of State [2000] PLR 102 considered.
In order to come within section 55(1), it would be necessary to have an on-site operation that could be said to be a building operation resulting in the creation of a building. “Building” was defined as including “any structure or erection” that included structures that would not ordinarily be called “buildings”.
In this case, the only work that had taken place on-site was the joining of the two halves and the addition of metal roofing sheets. That formed an essential part of the construction of the whole, and, if a building had resulted, the work would have constituted a building operation. It would not have been excepted by section 55(2), which provided that, inter alia, alteration works that did not materially affect the external appearance of a building should not be taken to involve development.
However, the shed was not a building. Its presence did not affect the physical character of the land. Its effect was visual. Although each case will turn on its own facts, and the approach of the court in other cases could be of only general rather than specific guidance, it was notable that in no other cases had a structure that was mobile to the extent of having wheels been held to be a building.
James Pereira (instructed by Tewkesbury Borough Council legal department) appeared for the claimants; the defendants appeared in person.
Eileen O’Grady, barrister
