The defendant approved a development of an accommodation centre for asylum seekers. The development was to be on land owned by the Home Office, but would be operated by its chosen contractor, who would be granted a lease of the land before the development commenced. There had been local opposition to the planned development, which culminated in an enquiry before a planning inspector. The inspector recommended in his report that approval should not be given for the proposed development. The defendant disagreed. The claimant then applied for judicial review of the defendant's decision and sought to have it quashed.
The claimant relied upon Section 299 in the Part XIII of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990 and asserted that as the Crown was granting a lease to a private developer who would run the accommodation on site, it should make an application for planning permission as if the land were not Crown land, and therefore could not rely upon Crown immunity from statutory control of development.

Reference

The Court decided that Section 299 of the Act was intended to give the Crown the option of disposing of land with the benefit of planning permission, but not to oblige it to apply for planning permission. The Crown was therefore at liberty to use the non-statutory procedure that it had in fact used of obtaining the view of a planning inspector, but disregarding his recommendations where it considered appropriate.

*Full case details
R (on the application of Cherwell District Council) vs First Secretary of State and Secretary of State for the Home Department (Interested Party) 6 April 2004, Administrative Court, Judgment of Mr Justice Collins.

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Postscript

This decision is of importance for PFI/PPP projects involving developments objectionable to local people. The proposed asylum centre in this case was to be built on unused Crown land near a prison in a rural area. Local people understandably resisted the idea, and the planning inspector considered three of their objections to be well founded. The local authority on behalf of the objectors sought to have the decision quashed on several grounds, some of which had been rejected both by the inspector and the defendant. Their main argument however was that the Crown acting through the Home Office was obliged to use the Planning Acts procedure and failed to do so. This argument was rejected by the judge. His decision will be a relief both for the Home Office and for developers and for potential contractors involved in PFI/PPP projects of a controversial nature such as this one. Provided that the central government policy is followed through rationally in selecting potentially appropriate sites, then the government will retain the discretion to give the development the green light even if the planning inspector's recommendations are against it. By the same token, the decision is disconcerting for local authorities and pressure groups who may have valid and compelling reasons for resisting such developments, as the Crown remains to a significant extent a judge in its own cause.