Hayter v First Secretary of State & Anor

Under Town and Country Planning Act 1990, section 288, the court reviews an inspector’s decision for error of law, not the merits of the planning judgment. A decision must be read as a whole. Identifying the main issue does not amount to prejudgment where the reasoning addresses the relevant dispute. Where an adopted local plan clearly shows that land lies outside a settlement inset, countryside policies apply and a frontage-development policy within the inset cannot govern the site. The absence of the complete proposals map before the inspector is immaterial where the relevant boundary and policy position are clear and undisputed. National guidance favouring housing on previously developed land does not override clear countryside policies.

The claimant applied for permission to erect a four-bedroom dwelling in the garden of his house at Beeches Hill, Hampshire. Winchester City Council refused permission on countryside-policy and recreational-open-space grounds. An inspector appointed by the First Secretary of State dismissed the claimant’s appeal.

The claimant sought under section 288 of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990 to quash the inspector’s decision. He argued that the site lay within a local-plan development frontage, that the inspector had prejudged the appeal, that the relevant map material was incomplete or inconsistent with national guidance, and that policies favouring development on previously developed land displaced the countryside policies.

1. Claim dismissed. The inspector’s decision was not vitiated by an error of law. The court’s function under section 288 of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990 was not to substitute its own planning judgment for that of the inspector.
2. The inspector’s statement of the main issue had to be read with the decision letter as a whole. The letter made clear that he had considered and rejected the claimant’s argument that the site was within an area where development would normally be permitted. The identification of the main issue therefore did not show prejudgment.
3. The Hampshire County Structure Plan defined the countryside as land outside existing and proposed built-up areas delineated in local plans. The local plan’s proposal map and inset showed the relevant boundary at the crossroads south of the appeal site. The site was outside the inset and was therefore subject to countryside policies. Policy H2, which permitted residential frontage development within defined development frontages, could not apply.
4. The inspector was entitled to rely on the relevant portions of the proposals map and inset. Planning inspectors were not bound by formal rules of evidence, and there was no disputed factual issue requiring production of the complete map. The map and insets complied with paragraph 26 of Annex A to PPG 12. Paragraph 27, which gives the written statement precedence in the event of contradiction, did not assist the claimant because no contradiction existed.
5. Policy guidance favouring the use of previously developed land, including PPG 3, did not provide a basis for disregarding the existing countryside policies. It could not convert land outside a housing frontage into land suitable for housing. The inspector was entitled, as a matter of planning judgment, to find that the proposed development harmed the character and appearance of the surrounding area and the setting of the settlement.
6. The appeal was dismissed with costs. The claimant was ordered to pay costs assessed at £3,679.25. Late service of a costs schedule did not remove the successful party’s entitlement to costs, although it could affect summary assessment or costs associated with detailed assessment.

The judgment itself was a first-instance judicial review under section 288 of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990 of an inspector’s dismissal of the claimant’s planning appeal. No earlier court decision is stated.