Planning permission subject to conditions — Caravans and no structures — Chalet erected on site — Whether breach of planning control — Whether chalet a caravan — Whether “caravan” has ordinary meaning or meaning in Caravan Sites and Control of Development Act 1960
In 1961 the appellant district council’s predecessors granted planning permission for the continued use of land as a caravan site subject to planning conditions. Only caravans were permitted and any other structures required express consent. A chalet was erected on the site without express consent, and enforcement notices were issued in 1985. The first respondent, the Secretary of State for the Environment, allowed appeals against those notices brought by the second respondent, Allen Caravan Estates Ltd, and quashed the notices.
The appellant’s appealed against the decision of Mr David Widdicombe QC (sitting as a deputy High Court judge) to dismiss their appeals against the Secretary of State’s decision. They contended that the word “caravan” in the planning condition of 1961 had been wrongly construed as having the meaning in the Caravan Sites and Control of Development Act 1960: it should be given an ordinary English meaning which would not include the erected chalet.
Held The appeal was allowed. At the time of the planning permission in 1961, “caravan” was interpreted within the context of the Town and Country Planning Act 1947 as meaning residential accommodation on wheels: Brutus v Cozens ([1972] 2 All ER 1297). The word “caravan” in the Caravan Sites and Control of Development Act 1960 has an enlarged meaning as including “any structure designed or adapted for human habitation which is capable of being moved from one place to another …”. The chalet could only be a caravan if the enlarged meaning applied.
As the application for the planning permission in question was in November 1960 for the continued use as a caravan site, the coming into force in the previous August of the 1960 Act did not give the enlarged meaning to the word “caravan” in the planning condition. The condition expressly stated that “no structures” were permitted, “structure” being the very word used in the Act. Accordingly the word “caravan” in the planning condition must be given its ordinary meaning and not the enlarged meaning in the 1960 Act: the chalet was a structure but not a caravan.
John Macdonald QC and Timothy Jones (instructed by the solicitor to the district council) appeared for the appellants; Clifford Clifford Joseph (instructed by Tozers, of Exeter) appeared for the second respondents; the first respondent, the Secretary of State for the Environment did not appear and was not represented.
