Bloor Homes East Midlands Ltd v Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government & Anor

A development plan is not absent merely because a further development plan document has not yet been adopted. Nor is it silent where its existing policies provide a sufficient basis for deciding whether the proposed development is acceptable in principle. National planning policy operates as a material consideration within, and does not alter, the statutory plan-led framework.

The assessment of five-year housing land supply involves planning judgment. However, where a contested discount to anticipated delivery on large sites could determine whether there is a five-year supply, an inspector must address it expressly and give intelligible reasons. A general conclusion on supply is insufficient. Failure to do so may require the decision to be quashed and remitted.

Bloor Homes East Midlands Ltd challenged, under section 288 of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990, an inspector’s dismissal of its planning appeal against the refusal of permission for 91 houses on land in the Rothley Brook Meadow Green Wedge between Groby and Ratby.

The inspector found that the council had a five-year housing land supply, that permission would be premature pending the Site Allocations Development Plan Document and Green Wedge review, and that the proposal would harm the Green Wedge and conflict with core strategy Policy 9.

The claim alleged errors concerning the presumption in favour of sustainable development, housing-land-supply methodology and reasons, prematurity, the Green Wedge, and whether Policy 9 was out of date.

1. The claim succeeded in part. The inspector’s decision was quashed and the planning appeal was remitted to the Secretary of State for redetermination.

2. The court rejected the contention that paragraph 14 of the National Planning Policy Framework was engaged because the development plan was absent or silent. A plan is absent only where no plan has been adopted for the relevant area and period. It is silent only where it lacks relevant policy. The lack of a site allocation in an emerging document did not make the extant plan absent or silent: core strategy Policies 8 and 9 gave an adequate basis for deciding the proposed housing development.

3. The inspector was entitled, as a matter of planning judgment, to prefer the Liverpool method to the Sedgefield method. Neither was prescribed by national policy. He was also entitled to conclude that a 5% buffer was appropriate and that the other appeal decisions did not require the same assessment in materially different circumstances.

4. However, the inspector failed to address the distinct issue of a 10% discount to anticipated delivery from large sites. That discount was not the same as the housing-supply buffer. It was a main controversial issue because acceptance of it could reduce the council’s supply below five years and materially affect the application of national policy, prematurity and the ultimate planning balance. The decision letter gave no intelligible indication whether the inspector had rejected the discount, or why. The court could not safely conclude that the result would inevitably have been the same.

5. The remaining grounds failed. Prematurity, the Green Wedge assessment and the effect of Policy 9 involved lawful planning judgment on the facts. A restrictive development-plan policy is not automatically out of date or inconsistent with national policy merely because it does not itself contain a cost-benefit qualification.

• High Court (Administrative Court): Allowed the section 288 challenge in part, quashed the inspector’s dismissal of the planning appeal, and remitted that appeal to the Secretary of State for redetermination.

• Planning appeal: The inspector had dismissed the claimant’s appeal against the council’s refusal of permission for 91 dwellings.