Content area
Full Text
Town and country planning | Neighbourhood plan
Court of Appeal (Civil Division)
14 March 2018
Underhill, Lindblom and Singh LJJ
[2018] EWCA Civ 450
[2018] PLSCS 51
Town and country planning - Neighbourhood plan - Referendum - Appellant applying for judicial review of decision of respondent city council to allow neighbourhood plan to proceed to local referendum - Whether respondent acting outside powers in departing from examiner's recommendations - Whether respondent failing to give sufficient reasons for modifications - Whether respondent wrongly failing to consult on modifications - Appeal dismissed
The appellant developer wished to develop a site at the Ridge, Linton, near Wetherby. The respondent city council had earmarked the site for possible housing development. In 2014 the interested party parish council prepared the neighbourhood plan, which went to an examination in 2015. The interested party opposed the site's development, hoping it might be returned to the green belt. The examiner's report concluded that, subject to modifications, the plan met the "basic conditions" in para 8(2) of Schedule 4B to the Town and Country Planning Act 1990.
The respondent decided on some modifications but went further than the examiner's recommendations by explaining why the interested party considered the Ridge unsuitable for development. The respondent allowed the modified plan to proceed to a referendum under para 12 of Schedule 4B to the 1990 Act. In a claim for judicial review, the appellant challenged the respondent's decision to allow the plan to proceed to a referendum before its adoption under section 38A(4) of the Planning and Compulsory Purchase Act 2004. The claim was...