Gopie, R (on the application of) v Mayor Of London & Ors

Permission to seek judicial review may properly be refused where granting relief would serve no practical purpose. This may be so even where the proposed challenge is arguable, if the decision-maker has reconsidered the matter, maintains the same substantive position, and the court cannot realistically provide effective relief.

Under the Town and Country Planning (Mayor of London) Order 2000, the Mayor’s power to direct refusal is subject to a statutory 14-day period. The Order requires reasons for a direction to refuse, but does not require reasons for declining to direct refusal.

The claimant, a Wembley resident, sought permission to challenge the Mayor of London’s decision not to direct Brent London Borough Council to refuse a planning application for a large residential and mixed-use development. The site was allocated as a primary employment area, although an earlier application for substantially the same development had resulted in a resolution to grant outline permission.

The Administrative Court refused permission for judicial review. It considered that the challenge to the Mayor’s reliance on the earlier resolution was arguable, but that a later reconsideration independently confirmed that the Mayor would not direct refusal. The claimant renewed her application to the Court of Appeal. The central issue was whether any useful relief could still be granted.

1. Application refused. The Court of Appeal agreed that permission to seek judicial review should be refused because there was no utility in granting permission or making a quashing order.
2. The alleged unlawfulness of the Mayor’s original decision was sufficiently arguable. That did not mean that a formal reconsideration would produce the opposite result. The Mayor had reconsidered the planning application and had firmly maintained his view that he did not wish to direct refusal.
3. The statutory scheme supported that conclusion. Article 5 of the Town and Country Planning (Mayor of London) Order 2000 gave the Mayor 14 days in which to direct the local planning authority to refuse the application. Article 5(4) required reasons for a direction to refuse, but the Order imposed no corresponding duty to give reasons for declining to direct refusal.
4. The local planning authority had twice resolved that the development should proceed, and the later grant of planning permission was not alleged to be unlawful. The authority could also reconsider the earlier, still-extant application, over which the Mayor would have no power under the 2000 Order.
5. Lord Justice Laws observed, without founding the decision on the point, that the expiry of the statutory 14-day period might mean that the Mayor no longer had power to direct refusal. The timetable was not apparently suspended by the commencement of judicial review proceedings. Lord Justice May agreed, including that any formal reconsideration might be statutorily impossible after the period had expired.
6. The Court declined to decide conclusively that final statutory-power issue. The decisive consideration was that effective relief could not realistically be granted.

• Court of Appeal (Civil Division): renewed application for permission to appeal refused; permission to seek judicial review also refused on the ground that relief would have no utility.
• Administrative Court: Mr George Bartlett QC, sitting as a Deputy High Court Judge, refused permission on 27 March 2002.