In St Modwen Developments Ltd v Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government and another [2016] EWHC 968 (Admin), the High Court has agreed with a planning inspector’s conclusion that plans for hundreds of new homes on the edge of a Yorkshire village would lead to an unacceptable loss of employment land.
The developer St Modwen wanted to build 510 homes near Melton, with 35 per cent of them affordable, along with a care home and other facilities. Alternatively, the company proposed 390 homes, with 40 per cent affordable, or 25 per cent if St Modwen paid £6m towards construction of a railway bridge.
However, East Riding of Yorkshire Council refused planning permission for both proposals. The Claimant then appealed to the Planning Inspectorate, but the appeal was dismissed. The Claimant then challenged that decision in the High Court, alleging errors of interpretation of the National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF) in relation to the Inspector’s conclusion and the Secretary of State’s acceptance that the Council had a 5 year supply of housing land, and to a lesser extent their alleged error of law in their approach to the offer of £6m, which was found to be so disproportionately great, in relation to the harm which the development was said to do to employment land, that it was discounted.
The High Court dismissed the appeal. Ouseley J noted that there was no dispute that the proposals conflicted with the local development plan and the emerging local plan. He went on to state that the inspector, though, had correctly albeit briefly but sufficiently approached the issue of housing land supply before concluding that there was no pressing need for additional development sites in the area. Also, the choice of method for assessing the housing requirement could afford no ground for quashing the decision because the Inspector, and the Secretary of State, reached the same view as to the adequacy of the housing supply whichever basis for the housing requirement was adopted. The inspector has not wrongly interpreted the NPPF in finding that there were an adequate number of deliverable housing sites. As to the argument by the Claimant that the impact of lost employment land would be minimised by the railway bridge, which would ease access to a large alternative site, the judge held that the Inspector was entitled to give the £6m offer little weight as it was not a reasonable response to the potential harm to the supply of employment land.
Martha Grekos is a partner and head of planning at Irwin Mitchell
