John Kerr v Welsh Ministers & Ors

A certificate of lawful existing use must describe the lawful use with clarity and precision. Information may be incorporated by reference, but the incorporation must itself be clear. Later correspondence does not become part of the certified description merely because it supplied information requested by the authority. Evidence submitted to establish lawfulness must be distinguished from the description of the use certified as lawful. A court should construe the certificate by its natural and ordinary meaning, read as a public document, and should not require a purchaser to inspect an authority’s file to identify uncertain limitations. Where a restriction is omitted from the certificate, it should not be inserted through an ambiguous reference to accompanying information.

The claimant sought statutory review under section 288 of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990 of an inspector’s decision allowing an appeal against refusal of outline planning permission for an expanded motocross and holiday development at Rhydblawd Farm.

The existing site use was covered by a certificate of lawful existing use issued in 1999. The certificate permitted motorcycle scrambling practice sessions on Sunday and Wednesday afternoons and three events per annum, “in accordance with details accompanying the application and in the information given on the application form”. The inspector treated the certificate as imposing no restriction on the number of motorcycles and assessed that use as the fallback position.

The claimant argued that correspondence in December 1998, including a reference to 10/12 motorcycles on the track, formed part of the certificate by incorporation. The central issue was whether the certificate contained that restriction.

1. The claim was dismissed. The proper construction of the certificate was a question of law. The inspector reached the correct conclusion that it imposed no restriction on the number of motorcycles.
2. The certificate did not on its face restrict motorcycle numbers. Although incorporation by reference could in principle include such a restriction, the incorporation would have to be clear and precise, because a public planning document must enable users and prospective purchasers to know what use is lawful.
3. The December 1998 letters were not “details accompanying the application”. They were sent after the application and could not be brought within that phrase without departing from its natural and ordinary meaning and undermining the definite scope of the application form.
4. Section 191(4) of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990 distinguishes between the description of the use and information supplied as evidence of its lawfulness. The documents referred to in the application were principally evidential. Treating selected information in the authority’s file as part of the certified description would create uncertainty as to which documents and passages had been incorporated.
5. The certificate’s wording and reasoning focused on the days and frequency of practice sessions and events, not motorcycle numbers. The references to three events per annum and “10/12” motorcycles also created inconsistency. If a numerical restriction was intended, it should have been included expressly in the certificate, particularly in its First Schedule.
6. The inspector’s approach was consistent with the requirement for certificates to be precisely drafted. His finding that the December Letters did not accompany the application was not Wednesbury unreasonable. The claimant’s arguments concerning the register and requests for further information under the applicable development orders did not alter the construction of the certificate.
7. Having correctly construed the certificate, the inspector was entitled to treat the certified use as the baseline and to find a real prospect of that fallback use occurring. The challenge to the planning decision therefore failed.

Not an appeal. The judgment concerns a first-instance statutory review under section 288 of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990. Permission to proceed on all three grounds had been granted by His Honour Judge Jarman KC on 17 December 2025.