Sandy Park Farm Partnership v Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government & Ors

In a challenge under section 288 of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990, the court reviews legality, not planning merits. Planning policy must be interpreted objectively in its proper context, but its application and the weight given to material considerations remain matters for the decision-maker.

An allocation policy permitting an alternative access arrangement is not necessarily breached because the arrangement differs from informal masterplan guidance. The relevant question is whether the arrangement frustrates the policy objectives identified in context. A competent authority considering protected species need not decide whether a licence will be granted. It must assess whether the development would be unlikely to obtain a licence under the statutory derogation tests. Adequate mitigation secured through planning conditions may support that assessment.

The claimant sought, under section 288 of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990, to quash an inspector’s decision allowing an appeal against Exeter City Council’s failure to determine an outline planning application for up to 350 dwellings.

The challenge concerned the interpretation of policy CP19 of the Exeter Core Strategy, the weight given to the Newcourt Masterplan, and the inspector’s treatment of protected bat species under the Conservation of Habitats and Species Regulations 2017 and article 12 of the Directive. The central issues were whether the inspector misunderstood policy, gave inadequate or irrational reasons, or failed properly to discharge his competent-authority duty.

1. Ground (1) dismissed. Planning policy is interpreted objectively and in context, but policy CP19 did not prescribe a single access route for development of the appeal site. It permitted an alternative to the access promoted by the Newcourt Masterplan, provided that the alternative did not preclude Old Rydon Lane from fulfilling its policy function as part of the green infrastructure framework.
2. That function was to provide safe and convenient walking and cycling routes, with the potential for use as a bus route. Policy CP19 did not prohibit additional vehicular traffic on Old Rydon Lane. The inspector was entitled to find that the proposed segregated pedestrian and cycle routes, together with the removal of through traffic and downgrading of part of the lane to a quiet street, would not frustrate those objectives.
3. Ground (2) dismissed. The weight given to the Masterplan was a matter of planning judgment. The inspector gave adequate and rational reasons for assigning it limited weight, including its status as non-statutory guidance, the Core Strategy’s direction to have only general regard to it, and previous deviations from it. The Masterplan’s promotion of northeastern access did not amount to an explicit requirement.
4. Ground (3) dismissed. Under regulation 9(3) of the Conservation of Habitats and Species Regulations 2017, the inspector correctly asked whether the development was unlikely to be licensed under regulation 55. He was not required positively to determine that a licence would be granted. The relevant considerations were imperative reasons of overriding public interest, the absence of a satisfactory alternative, and the absence of detriment to favourable conservation status.
5. The inspector was entitled to rely on the strategic allocation and associated public benefits in assessing the likelihood of a licence, to conclude that retention of the existing buildings was not a clear alternative, and to take account of mitigation secured through conditions. The age of the ecological surveys did not make his reliance on the ecological impact assessment irrational or require further inquiry.
6. The inspector had regard to the impact on bats. Since that impact was not a main issue in dispute and the inspector had concluded that secured mitigation would avoid long-term effects, he was not required to refer expressly to it again in the overall planning balance. The claim was dismissed.