Save North St Albans Green Belt v St Albans City and District Council
| Jurisdiction | England & Wales |
| Judge | Mrs Justice Lang |
| Judgment Date | 04 August 2022 |
| Neutral Citation | [2022] EWHC 2087 (Admin) |
| Docket Number | Case No: CO/679/2022 |
| Court | Queen's Bench Division (Administrative Court) |
| Year | 2022 |
The Queen on the application of
[2022] EWHC 2087 (Admin)
Mrs Justice Lang DBE
Case No: CO/679/2022
IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUSTICE
QUEEN'S BENCH DIVISION
PLANNING COURT
Royal Courts of Justice
Strand, London, WC2A 2LL
Jenny Wigley QC (instructed by Richard Buxton Solicitors) for the Claimants
Matthew Dale-Harris (instructed by Finance & Legal Department) for the Defendant
Paul Stinchcombe QC (instructed by Sherrards Solicitors LLP) for the First Interested Party
The Second Interested Party did not appear and was not represented
Hearing date: 26 July 2022
Approved Judgment
The Claimants apply for judicial review of the decision of the Defendant (“the Council”), made on 12 January 2022, to grant outline planning permission to the Interested Parties (“the IPs”) for a residential development of up to 150 dwellings at land to the rear of 112–156b Harpenden Road, St Albans, Hertfordshire, known as Sewell Park (“the Site”). The Site is within the Metropolitan Green Belt (“the Green Belt”).
The First Claimant is an action group formed by local residents. It is represented in these proceedings by the Second Claimant, who is a Committee Member of the First Claimant, and the Third Claimant, who is its Treasurer. The Defendant is the local planning authority. The Interested Parties are the applicants for planning permission. Only the First Interested Party (“IP1”) has participated in these proceedings.
I granted permission to apply for judicial review on the papers on 12 April 2022.
Ground of challenge
There were originally five grounds of challenge. However, following evidence received from the Defendant and IP1, the Claimants decided not to pursue Grounds 4 and 5. The remaining three grounds may be summarised as follows.
Ground 1
The advice given in the planning officer's report (“OR”) to Members of the Planning Referrals Committee (“the Committee”) significantly misled them as to the basis upon which it was justifiable to depart from previous decisions refusing planning permission at this Site.
Ground 2
The Council was under a duty to give reasons for its decision to grant permission, and why it departed from the previous decisions refusing planning permission at the Site. The reasons in the OR were inadequate and insufficient on this issue.
Ground 3
The OR relied upon material in support of the application for planning permission which was based on an earlier proposal for only 132 dwellings, whereas the proposal before the Committee was “up to 150” dwellings. This was misleading in a number of respects, and failed to provide Members with accurate evidence to enable them to evaluate the impacts of the proposed development. The OR contained a material error of fact at paragraph 8.2.12, describing the density of dwelling as 40 per hectare, when the correct figure was 45.5 dwellings per hectare. Therefore the Planning Committee acted unlawfully by taking into account irrelevant considerations and failed to take into account relevant considerations.
Planning application
The Site is 5.24 hectares in size and it is located in the Green Belt. It is greenfield meadow land. To the south and west, it borders residential dwellings in Harpenden Road and Sandridgebury Lane. There is development to the north – dwellings and playing fields. Open farmland lies immediately to the east and north east of the Site.
The application for planning permission, made on 7 December 2020, was for outline planning permission for 150 residential units and access, with all other matters reserved. It proposed a mix of private and affordable housing units and 255 car parking spaces. The property at 126 Harpenden Road was to be demolished to provide access to the Site.
There were over 270 objections to the proposal, in particular, to the harm to the Green Belt, loss of landscape and open space, environmental impacts, increased traffic congestion and pressure on schools, doctors etc. It was pointed out that previous applications at this Site had been rejected, and nothing had changed since those decisions were made. Development of sites for housing should take place via the local plan process. A petition objection was signed by approximately 1,500 local signatories. St Michael's Parish Council submitted lengthy objections, which including the following representation:
“Previous applications/appeal for this site (in various configurations) have failed and this latest application does not appear to put forward any compelling changes to set aside the planning refusals recorded.
The recent failure of the St Albans Local Plan process should not lead to a capitulation to speculative development. The current principles of Green Belt policy enshrined in the National Planning Policy Framework must prevail since no very special circumstances have been shown which would allow Green Belt status to be set aside for this development.”
The application was considered by the Committee on 26 July 2021, and it resolved to grant planning permission, subject to the completion of an agreement under section 106 of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990 within 3 months. The agreement was not completed within the required 3 months, and so the application was referred back to the Committee.
On 25 October 2021, the Committee again resolved to grant planning permission, subject to completion of a section 106 agreement by 31 March 2022. The section 106 agreement was subsequently completed and the Council formally issued the grant of outline planning permission on 12 January 2022, subject to conditions.
Planning history
The Site has been the subject of a number of previous applications for planning permission for housing under references: 5/2011/1724 and 5/2011/2857 (the “2011 Applications”), 5/2012/2713 (the “2012 Application”) and 5/2014/0093 (the “2014 Application”).
The first 2011 Application (5/2011/1724) was for 116 houses and a 72 bed care home, together with the formation of new accesses to Harpenden Road, two tennis courts, and public open space. It was refused on 27 October 2011 and an appeal against that refusal was dismissed on 3 July 2012.
The second 2011 Application (5/2011/2857) was a duplicate of the first and was refused on 10 February 2012. An appeal against that refusal was dismissed on 12 March 2013. The appeal decision was subsequently quashed by the High Court, as confirmed in the Court of Appeal ( Hunston Properties Limited v (1) Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government and (2) St Albans City and District Council [2013] EWHC 2678 (Admin); [2013] EWCA Civ 1610). The appeal (known as ‘Appeal A’) was then redetermined and again dismissed by the Secretary of State on 11 August 2015.
The 2012 Application (5/2012/2713) was for the erection of 85 dwellings, the formation of new accesses to Harpenden Road, two tennis courts, and public open space. This was a reduced number of dwellings and the care home was omitted. The extent of the proposed built development was restricted to the west of a ‘rounding-off’ line referred to in the appeal decisions. The 2012 Application was refused permission by the Council on 16th January 2013.
An appeal against that refusal (known as ‘Appeal B’) was heard at the same time as the above redetermined appeal in respect of 5/2011/2857 (Appeal A), and also dismissed on 11 August 2015.
The 2014 Application was essentially a resubmission of the 2012 Application, again with the built development restricted to the west of a ‘rounding-off’ line, although the red line boundary of the application site was increased in size in the 2014 Application to incorporate the wider site considered under the 2011 Application.
The Council's primary reason for refusal in each of the 2011 Applications, the 2012 Application and the 2014 Application was the same and recorded as follows:
“The proposed development, and its scale, represents inappropriate development within the Metropolitan Green Belt which would cause substantial harm to the fundamental intention and purposes of including land in the Green Belt, by reason of encouraging urban sprawl and compromising its openness, and the applicant has failed to demonstrate compelling reasons that the intended financial contributions and benefits meet the very special circumstances necessary to warrant the fundamental policy objection being overridden. The proposal is thereby contrary to Policy 1 ‘Metropolitan Green Belt’ of the St Albans District Local Plan Review, 1994 and the aims and objectives of Planning Policy Guidance Note 2.”
As set out above, the redetermination of the appeal against the refusal of the 2011 Application ref 5/2011/2857 and the appeal against the refusal of the 2012 Application were heard together at an inquiry in July 2014. Both appeals (Appeal A and Appeal B) were recovered by the Secretary of State and were dismissed. The Secretary of State agreed with the recommendation of the Inspector who reported on the Inquiry (see Appeal Decision dated 11 August 2015). Again, the primary reason for refusal related to the location of the Site in the Green Belt. The Secretary of State considered that the proposals “would significantly reduce the openness of the Green Belt, to its considerable detriment, and would amount to unrestricted sprawl, compromising, in the main, two of its purposes, thereby adding appreciably to the substantial harm by virtue of inappropriateness” (paragraph 12).
Policies
As the Site is in the Green Belt, it is subject to saved Policy 1 of the St Albans Local Plan Review 1994, which forms part of the Council's...
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