Stevenage borough council faces having to draw up a new core strategy after losing a high court battle this week.
The council was attempting to overturn a planning inspector’s decision that its core strategy was unsound, but a high court judge quashed the attempt this week.
Stevenage’s core strategy was planning for almost 21,000 new homes in the period to 2026, in accordance with the East of England Plan.
At least 9,600 of those new homes would have been built as urban extensions crossing the boundary into the neighbouring North Hertfordshire district.
However, North Hertfordshire has long opposed any expansion of Stevenage.
In his report, the planning inspector decided that because the East of England Plan has been revoked, and North Hertfordshire district council did not intend to proceed with any scheme of its own that complied with the plan, Stevenage’s core strategy was undeliverable and, thus, unsound.
Mr Justice Ouseley, said: “The soundness of the core strategy in realityfoundered on a lack of lawful co-operation.”
“The Stevenage Core Strategy is critically dependent for its practical implementation on a local authority which is opposed to that strategy and intends not to co-operate in its achievement.”
Daniel Farrand, head of planning at Mishcon de Reya said: “While the case pre-dates royal assent of the Localism Act, the judge gives us perhaps the first hints of how the new duty to co-operate may be interpreted in practice.”
Stevenage borough council said it will now take further legal advice ahead of deciding what to do next early in the New Year.
Nick.whitten@estatesgazette.com
