Plant, R (on the application of) v Lambeth London Borough Council

Judicial review of a local authority’s estate-regeneration decision examines legality, not the merits. A broad housing-management discretion gives the authority substantial room to weigh value for money, housing need and technical evidence. Officers’ reports are read as a whole and in context; disagreement with expert financial or design assessments is insufficient unless reliance on them is irrational. Consultation duties are context-sensitive. A failure matters only if it makes the process unfair and causes substantial prejudice. A secure tenant’s conditional statutory right to buy is not a possession protected by A1P1 where the secure tenancy may lawfully be ended for redevelopment.

The claimant was a secure tenant on the Cressingham Gardens Estate. He challenged the defendant council’s Cabinet resolution authorising demolition and redevelopment of the whole estate, including displacement of existing tenants and owners.

The claim followed an earlier judicial review concerning the consultation process: R (Bokrosova) v Lambeth London Borough Council [2015] EWHC 3386 (Admin); [2016] PTSR 355. The claimant advanced seven grounds concerning consultation, financial modelling, technical evidence, the right to buy and the council’s positive-NPV criterion. The central questions were whether the decision-making or consultation was unlawful and whether any error caused material prejudice.

1. Claim dismissed. The Cabinet’s decision to authorise the complete redevelopment of the estate was lawful. The claimant’s application for permission to appeal was refused. The defendant was entitled to its costs.
2. Under Housing Act 1985, s 21(1), the council had a broad discretion to manage its housing stock. The court determined whether a matter was legally capable of being relevant, but the council generally decided whether to consider it and how far to investigate it. A failure was unlawful only where no reasonable authority could have omitted the matter, or where it was so obviously material that omission was inconsistent with the statutory purpose.
3. The court applied a wide, context-sensitive margin of review. The Cabinet was democratically accountable and assisted by professional advisers. Officers’ reports had to be read as a whole and in a common-sense way. Reliance on specialist financial, design or technical advice could be challenged only for legal error or irrationality. The various criticisms of the reports and the discounted-cash-flow modelling did not meet that threshold.
4. The consultation under Housing Act 1985, s 105, had to be assessed in its statutory and factual context. The council could put forward option 5 as its preferred option and did not have to provide a detailed analysis of every rejected alternative. The inaccurate emphasis on borrowing headroom did not make the consultation unlawful because the council’s separate value-for-money conclusion was not challenged and no substantial prejudice was shown.
5. Consultation may require information about realistic alternatives and the reasons for a preferred proposal where meaningful public participation requires it. However, the scope of that requirement depends on context. A procedural defect is not sufficient without material unfairness or substantial prejudice. The claimant failed to show that the alleged omissions could have affected the decision.
6. The statutory right to buy was conditional on the continuing existence of the secure tenancy. A possession order under s 84 and ground 10 in Schedule 2 could terminate that tenancy. The potential right to buy was therefore not a possession protected by Article 1 of the First Protocol. The council’s failure to address a possible contractual right to buy in a future assured tenancy was not material to the decision to select redevelopment. That issue concerned implementation, not the choice between redevelopment and refurbishment.
7. The council had promised further consultation on the terms of the new assured tenancies, including the contractual right-to-buy issue. That promise created a legitimate expectation. The council was required not to frustrate that consultation or any resulting decision. A declaration was made to that effect. Any errors were alternatively incapable of affecting the outcome, and relief would also have been refused under s 31(2A) of the Senior Courts Act 1981.

This was a first-instance judicial review. Permission was granted on 19 August 2016 and the substantive hearing took place in November 2016.

The judgment records an earlier related judicial review in which R (Bokrosova) v Lambeth London Borough Council quashed an earlier consultation decision: [2015] EWHC 3386 (Admin); [2016] PTSR 355. The present claim challenged the council’s later Cabinet resolution of 21 March 2016.