Dinedor Hill Action Association v County of Herefordshire District Council & Anor

A planning authority rejecting an inspector’s recommendation must give clear, separate and intelligible reasons for each objection and must explain why the inspector’s planning judgment is rejected. Where competing planning considerations require a balance, the reasons must show how that balance was struck. A failure to do so may substantially prejudice objectors and justify quashing the policy. Subsequent events cannot ordinarily justify a decision retrospectively. A further inquiry is required only where the authority’s refusal to hold one is irrational in the circumstances. Public bodies resisting planning challenges must adopt a full and fair disclosure approach. The court quashed the Bullinghope housing allocation because the authority failed to engage with the inspector’s reasons and relied on an inadequately explained need for additional housing.

The claimant challenged the inclusion of land at Bullinghope for housing in Policy H2 of the Herefordshire Unitary Development Plan. The inspector had recommended retaining an allocation at Holmer instead and had concluded that Bullinghope was unsuitable because it would encroach substantially into open countryside and breach the railway boundary of Hereford.

The defendant rejected that recommendation, relying principally on the need to secure the county’s housing requirement and funding for the Rotherwas Access Road. It declined to hold a further inquiry. The central issues were whether the defendant had given lawful reasons for rejecting the inspector’s recommendation, whether the failure caused substantial prejudice, and whether the decision not to hold a further inquiry was irrational.

1. Reasons. Regulation 27(1) of the Town and Country Planning (Development Plan) (England) Regulations 1999 required the authority to explain its decisions and its reasons for departing from the inspector’s recommendations. Regulation 28(1) required separate reasons for each objection. Applying South Bucks D.C. v Porter (No 2) [2004] 1 W.L.R. 1953, the reasons had to enable readers to understand the conclusions reached. The authority also had to explain why the inspector’s planning judgment was rejected, particularly where housing need was being balanced against landscape and other planning disadvantages.
2. The authority’s reasons did not address the inspector’s detailed findings that Bullinghope was unsuitable, that the railway formed an appropriate boundary, and that the additional housing could be provided elsewhere. The asserted need for certainty that a maximum housing figure would be achieved did not justify an unexplained over-allocation.
3. Prejudice and relief. The failure substantially prejudiced the objectors. It could not be said that proper reconsideration would inevitably produce the same result. The court therefore quashed the Bullinghope allocation, together with the related reference in paragraph 5.4 and paragraph 5.4.13 of the UDP.
4. Further inquiry. Although the precise question whether both Holmer and Bullinghope were needed had not been considered at the inquiry, the inspector had considered the overall housing requirement and concluded that the requirement could be met without both sites. In the circumstances, the refusal to hold a further inquiry was not irrational. The court left any decision whether to hold a further inquiry after quashing the allocation to the defendant.
5. Disclosure and case management. A public body must make full and fair disclosure of relevant material in a planning challenge. The court held that the R v Lancashire CC ex p Huddleston [1986] 2 All ER 941 approach applied to claims under sections 287 and 288 of the 1990 Act and their successors. Directions should generally require evidence and at least summary grounds of defence within 10 weeks, subject to justified variation.