International UK Ltd. v First Secretary of State & Anor

A compulsory purchase decision will withstand a reasons challenge where the decision letter and incorporated inspector’s report, read as a whole, identify and address the principal controversial issues in an intelligible way. The documents are read as addressed to informed readers familiar with the dispute. The court must respect the decision-maker’s planning judgment unless the reasons disclose legal error, irrationality or substantial doubt. A compulsory purchase order requires a compelling case in the public interest, including where comprehensive regeneration is said to require unified ownership and timely implementation.

The claimant owned part of land included in a compulsory purchase order made by the London Development Agency for the Wembley regeneration scheme. Following a public inquiry, the Inspector recommended confirmation of the order, including the claimant’s land. The Secretary of State accepted the recommendation and the Inspector’s reasons. The claimant accepted the need for regeneration and the pedestrian link but challenged the adequacy and intelligibility of the reasons for acquiring the balance of its land. The central issue was whether the decision documents disclosed a lawful and compelling public-interest case for that acquisition.

1. Claim dismissed. The Secretary of State’s decision was lawful, intelligible and rational. The claimant was ordered to pay the First Secretary of State’s costs, summarily assessed at £9,060. The London Development Agency was to bear its own costs. Permission to appeal was refused.
2. The applicable approach was that stated by Lord Brown in South Bucks District Council v Porter (No 2) [2004] 1 WLR 1953. The decision-maker’s planning judgment is his or her own. The decision letter and Inspector’s report must be read as a whole and in a straightforward manner. They must address the principal important controversial issues, but need not answer every subsidiary argument or use formulaic language.
3. The Inspector distinguished between the urgent pedestrian link and the wider redevelopment of land between the railway and South Way. He found that the link could not reliably be secured through planning conditions or section 106 agreements within the required timescale. He further found that unified ownership was the key to the wider scheme and that there was little confidence in the claimant’s ability to deliver the required regeneration.
4. Those findings supplied an intelligible basis for concluding that regeneration was more likely if the claimant’s whole site were acquired, and that there was a compelling public interest in retaining it within the order. The absence of fixed dates for the whole redevelopment did not invalidate the conclusion, because the finding of urgent need had to be read in the context of the stadium and pedestrian link as catalysts for wider regeneration.
5. On costs, the participation of an interested party is not automatically sufficient to justify a second set of costs. Although the London Development Agency had a genuine interest and had assisted the court, its position substantially duplicated that of the Secretary of State. Fairness therefore required it to bear its own costs.

The Secretary of State confirmed the London Development Agency’s compulsory purchase order after a six-day public inquiry and receipt of the Inspector’s report. The Administrative Court dismissed the claimant’s statutory challenge under section 23 of the Acquisition of Land Act 1981.