Court of Appeal
Published January 25, 2008
White v Herefordshire Council

A purchase notice under Part VI of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990 could not be amended but there was nothing to prevent the landowner from serving a second notice if, for example, the planning authority decided the first was defective.

Whether the second notice amounted to a withdrawal of the first had to be determined objectively by what the owner said and did. A failure by the planning authority to refer the notice to the Secretary of State for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs did not give rise to a deemed confirmation of the notice.

The Court of Appeal (Lord Justice Latham, Lord Justice Dyson and Lord Justice Jacob) so held on November 21, 2007, allowing an appeal by the defendant, Herefordshire Council, from a decision on December 14, 2007 of Judge Gilbart, QC, in the Lands Tribunal that it had jurisdiction to determine compensation payable in respect of a purchase notice served by the claimant, Richard White, in respect of 83 Tower Hill, Upper Dormington, near Hereford.

LORD JUSTICE DYSON said the claimant’s notices contended that because planning permission for development had been refused, the land was incapable of reasonably beneficial use in its present state.

The right to amend a notice did not arise by necessary implication from the statute, which did not prohibit the issue of more than one notice.

The owner whose notice was not referred to the secretary of state could apply for extension of time or make a new planning application.

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