Draft local plan — Major housing allocation — Objections — Public local inquiry — Modifications — Refusal of further public inquiry — Adoption of draft local plan — Whether refusal unfair and unreasonable — Application to quash local plan — High Court holding that no grounds made out for quashing local plan — Application refused
Uttlesford district in Essex contained Stansted Airport. In May 1990 the council published their consultation draft of the Uttlesford local plan for the period 1991-2001. It proposed that airport-related housing should be concentrated at two sites, the sugar beet factory at Felsted (1,100 units) and land to the north-east of Takeley (1,400) units. Felsted, Little Dunmow, Takeley and Birchanger parish councils and Felsted and Little Dunmow conservative association (“the applicants”) raised various objections to the proposed allocations. Following the consultation exercise the council prepared a deposit version of the plan. Contrary to the recommendations of the council’s officers (who favoured a scheme with 850 units at Felsted, 1,300 at Takeley and 350 at Rochford Nurseries), this removed the allocations in the consultation draft and replaced them with a proposal for 2,500 units in a new settlement at Easton Park close to Stansted Airport. The draft plan was placed on deposit on April 30 1992.
Objections were raised to the draft plan which led to a public local inquiry. The inspector recommended modification of the plan by the deletion of the Easton Park allocation and its replacement by housing allocations at Felsted (650 houses), Takeley (825 houses), Great Dunmow (625 houses) and Rochford Nurseries (400 houses). The applicants disagreed with the recommendations and asked for a separate public inquiry to examine the issue of airport-related housing. This was refused and the applicants challenged the decision to adopt the plan without holding a further inquiry.
Held The applicants failed to make out any grounds for quashing the local plan. The application was refused.
1. In relation to local plan procedures, as a whole, the essential requirement was that the objectors should have an opportunity of communicating to the council their reasons for their objections to the modifications and the facts on which they were based: cf Bushell v Secretary of State for the Environment [1981] AC 75.
2. What was a fair procedure to be adopted in that respect had to be judged having regard to all the circumstances.
3. In considering the requirements of fairness account had to be taken of the interests of other parties who had participated in the earlier stages of the process. The extent to which they might be prejudiced or burdened by a further inquiry was a relevant consideration as was the public interest in having an up to date operative local plan and thus reaching the stage of adoption without undue delay.
4. In the light of those considerations it was difficult to see that the decision not to hold an inquiry could be unreasonable in the absence of any new points of substance in the objections made to the modifications: see Niarchos (London) Ltd v Secretary of State for the Environment (No 2) [1981] JPL 118; R v Secretary of State for the Environment, ex parte Fielder Estates (Canvey) Ltd (1988) 57 P&CR 424.
5. Accordingly, the decision not to hold a further inquiry, when considered against the background of the totality of the local plan procedure, was not unreasonable or procedurally unfair.
John Steel QC and Murray Hunt (instructed by Hewitson Becke & Shaw, of Northampton) appeared for the applicants; Duncan Ouseley QC and Thomas Hill (instructed by Jameson & Hill, of Hertford, agents for the solicitor to Uttlesford District Council) appeared for the respondents.
