Oakley v South Cambridgeshire District Council & Anor

A local planning authority is not generally required by the common law to give reasons when granting planning permission. A duty may nevertheless arise where fairness, having regard to the nature of the decision-making process or subject matter, requires reasons, or where the decision appears aberrant or inexplicable. Complexity alone is insufficient. Planning committees are entitled to disagree with an officer’s recommendation, and such disagreement does not itself establish an aberration.

The claimant sought judicial review of the defendant council’s decision to grant planning permission for a 3,000-seat football ground in the Green Belt. The planning officer had recommended refusal, but the planning committee delegated approval subject to further matters and gave no reasons. The permission stated that a committee or delegation report setting out the basis of the decision was available online.

The claimant alleged both an implied common-law duty to give reasons and frustration of a legitimate expectation arising from the wording of the permission. The central issues were whether the circumstances required reasons despite Town and Country Planning (Development Management Procedure) (England) Order 2015, art 35(1), and whether the published wording promised a further explanatory report.

1. Application dismissed. The common law may require reasons notwithstanding the absence of a statutory reasons duty. The relevant question is what fairness demands in the statutory and decision-making context: Lloyd v McMahon and ex parte Doody were treated as establishing that approach.
2. The removal of the statutory requirement to give reasons for grants of planning permission did not exclude a common-law duty. It was relevant context, but did not determine the common-law question.
3. The planning context strongly militated against implying a general duty. Planning committees consist of democratically accountable councillors capable of making judgmental decisions. Officer reports identify the legal framework and material considerations, but the ultimate planning judgment belongs to the committee. Members may lawfully disagree with an officer’s recommendation.
4. The recognised circumstances in which reasons may be required are not closed. They include cases where the nature of the process or subject matter calls for reasons, and cases involving something peculiar to the decision or an apparent aberration making the result inexplicable. A decision cannot be required to provide reasons merely because the absence of reasons prevents a challenge based on those reasons.
5. The committee’s departure from the officer’s recommendation did not amount to an aberration. The officer’s report supplied a route map through the development plan and the National Planning Policy Framework. The committee was presumed to have engaged with those issues and was entitled to exercise its own planning judgment. Complexity was not a separate touchstone, although it might be relevant in a case that otherwise appeared aberrant.
6. The legitimate-expectation claim failed. A reasonable reader would understand the reference to the committee report as referring to the officer’s report already available online, not as a promise of a later, more particular explanation.