Bridgewood Rochester Ltd v Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government

An appeal under section 288 of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990 is confined to the established legal principles governing challenges to planning decisions. The court does not substitute its own planning judgment for that of the inspector. An alleged omission is not material where the relevant policy would not have advanced the issue the inspector had to decide. Challenges based on speculative economic or relocation benefits will fail where the evidence does not permit their importance to be assessed. A decision will withstand challenge where, read fairly, the inspector addressed the competing planning considerations and gave a rational explanation for the balance reached.

The appellant applied for outline planning permission for three motor vehicle showrooms, servicing, repairs and ancillary offices at Rochester. Medway Council failed to determine the application within the statutory period, resulting in a deemed refusal. A planning inspector dismissed the appeal, finding that the economic benefits of the proposal did not outweigh the harm and policy objections arising from its location within a strategic gap and an Area of Local Landscape Importance.

The appellant challenged the inspector’s decision under section 288 of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990, alleging failures to consider local policy R19, existing showroom operators, relocation benefits and the proper effect of policy BNE34.

1. Appeal dismissed. The challenge was governed by the principles stated in Ashbridge Investments Ltd v Minister of Housing and Local Government [1965] 1 WLR 1320. The court’s function was to determine whether the inspector made an error of law, not to review the planning merits or substitute its own judgment.
2. The inspector had not treated policy BNE34 as imposing an absolute prohibition on development within an Area of Local Landscape Importance. Although he did not expressly repeat its proviso concerning sufficiently important economic and social benefits, he addressed that issue in the remainder of his decision and concluded that the benefits did not outweigh the landscape and planning objections.
3. The evidence concerning possible relocation by existing motor showroom operators consisted only of general expressions of interest. There was no worked-out relocation proposal or detailed assessment of the resulting economic benefits. The inspector was therefore entitled to regard the importance of those benefits as difficult to establish.
4. The evidence concerning housing or other benefits from vacated sites was similarly speculative. The inspector was entitled to conclude that the site might attract interest without deciding whether prospective occupiers would relocate from within or outside Medway.
5. Policy R19 concerned the quality of vehicle showrooms and associated uses in appropriate locations. It did not answer the anterior question whether this site was appropriate. The inspector’s failure expressly to mention it did not undermine the decision.
6. Read as a whole, the inspector’s decision was a well-reasoned planning judgment. The alleged omissions, individually or cumulatively, disclosed no error of law. The appellant was ordered to pay the respondent’s assessed costs of £4,228.

The appeal was brought under section 288 of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990 against a planning inspector’s decision dated 31 July 2006 dismissing the appellant’s appeal against the deemed refusal of planning permission. The High Court dismissed the statutory appeal.