Corus UK Ltd, R (on the application of) v Erewash Borough Council

A local planning authority may reject an inspector’s recommendation on a local plan, provided it acts within the substance of the recommendation and gives adequate reasons where required. The recommendation must be read as a whole. A recommendation to allocate a particular site is not necessarily unconditional where the inspector has separately accepted a policy of offsetting a housing shortfall in one sub-area against over-provision in another. A site need not be included in a shorter-period local plan merely because it might have contributed to a longer-term housing supply. The claim therefore failed where the authority applied the accepted offsetting policy and had no operative need to allocate further housing land.

The claimant owned the contaminated Oakwell Brickworks site, which had previously featured as a potential housing site in local plan documents. Following a local plan inquiry, the inspector recommended its reinstatement in Proposal H1. The Council instead deleted Proposal H1 in its entirety, relying on updated housing figures showing borough-wide over-provision and applying an offsetting policy between sub-areas.

The claimant sought judicial review, arguing that the inspector’s recommendation required unconditional allocation of Oakwell Brickworks, that the Council had failed to address the inspector’s conclusions, and that the site should have been retained as part of a ten-year housing supply. The central issue was whether the Council’s response was consistent with the inspector’s report and legally adequate.

1. Claim dismissed. Judgment was entered for the Council, with the claimant to pay the Council’s costs, subject to assessment if not agreed.
2. The inspector’s report had to be read as a whole. Although the inspector expressed favourable views about Oakwell Brickworks and rejected exclusion based on contamination or non-deliverability, he separately accepted the legitimacy of offsetting the Ilkeston shortfall against over-provision in Long Eaton and Derby.
3. By recommending insertion of paragraph 2.9a, which expressly permitted the over-provision in other sub-areas to meet the Ilkeston shortfall, the inspector legitimised the offsetting policy. His recommendation concerning Oakwell was therefore not an unconditional requirement that the site be allocated regardless of that policy.
4. The Council acted within the inspector’s recommendation when it applied offsetting and deleted Proposal H1 in its entirety. It did not unlawfully discriminate against Oakwell, since all uncommitted sites in the H1 list were treated alike.
5. The argument concerning a ten-year housing supply also failed. The inspector criticised the absence of such provision but did not recommend that the local plan itself contain a ten-year plan. The Council was not required to include Oakwell in the shorter-period plan merely because it might have been relevant to a longer-term supply.
6. Any challenge based on the adequacy of reasons could not succeed on the facts. The Council’s reasons were apparent from the continuing and substantial housing over-provision. In any event, quashing the plan would have been fruitless because the local development framework system had superseded the relevant local plan process.