Bokhari, R (on the application of) v First Secretary of State & Anor

In a challenge under section 288 of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990, an inspector’s planning judgment will not be unlawful merely because the claimant considers that the evidence or weight given to competing considerations was insufficient. Where the parties address an issue in general terms, the inspector need not provide a more detailed assessment than the material before him reasonably requires. A challenge to the character of an area ordinarily raises planning judgment rather than an error of law. Conditions need not be considered in detail where no particular condition is proposed and a condition could not overcome the principal planning objection or radically alter the development.

The claimant applied under section 288 of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990 to quash an inspector’s decision dismissing his appeal against the refusal of planning permission by the London Borough of Newham. The proposal concerned the retrospective change of use of residential accommodation to a solicitor’s office, together with alterations to the frontage and removal of a rear extension.

The inspector identified impacts on housing stock, the character and appearance of the area, and the living conditions of adjoining occupiers. The claimant challenged the decision on grounds including inadequate consideration of community benefit, factual error, speculation, failure to investigate neighbouring commercial uses, and failure to consider conditions.

1. The application was dismissed. The inspector’s decision disclosed no arguable error of law. The court emphasised that the decision was principally an exercise of planning judgment.
2. The inspector had correctly begun with the relevant statutory development plan policy, as required by section 54 A of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990. He accurately understood policy H2, which resisted the loss of residential accommodation subject to an overriding community benefit or specific need.
3. The inspector had considered the claimed community benefit of the solicitor’s office, including the need for legal advice following the closure of a local law centre. Since the claimant had advanced the benefit only in general terms, the inspector was not required to undertake a more detailed assessment. His conclusion that the benefit was limited was open to him.
4. The inspector was entitled to conclude that the relevant northern part of Green Street was almost exclusively residential in character, despite the wider street being commercial. Whether to draw a distinction at Westbury Terrace was a matter of planning judgment and did not raise an error of law.
5. The findings concerning noise and disturbance were properly based on an issue raised in the council’s refusal and representations. The inspector was also entitled to mention the neighbouring estate agent’s office without inviting further representations, because neither party had relied on its planning history and it was not a reason for refusal.
6. The suggestion that conditions might be imposed lacked particularity. In any event, no condition could overcome the loss of residential accommodation contrary to policy H2, and a condition could not lawfully relocate the proposed doorway so as to transform the proposal.
7. The claimant was ordered to pay the first defendant’s costs, summarily assessed at £3,197.

The judgment does not state any prior judicial appeal. It concerns a statutory challenge to a planning inspector’s decision following the claimant’s appeal against the second defendant’s refusal of planning permission.