Accuracy of planning application

[AlwaysMoreCoffee]

Planning experts welcome! I would value your opinions!

Neighbouring land to our house has been sold to a developer. Their first application was hotly contested by a lot of us neighbours. A key point, to our mind, was that their application was inaccurate, not just on one point but on several- they didn’t accurately represent their boundary, their proposed building overlapped into land they didn’t own, they wanted to chop down trees that weren’t theirs, that kind of thing.

It was refused, thankfully, but the reasons given didn’t include any of these inaccuracies and I haven’t been able to find that “not making up total bollocks” is actually a requirement of an application. We invited the inspector/councillors/everyone we could think of to come and visit and take their own measurements and decide for themselves, but it’s not mentioned in the final decision.

How does one hold a developer to account if they’re doing this kind of thing? The planning officer did not seem remotely interested and if he did visit then we never spotted him (due to covid lots of noisy neighbours have been home all day!!).

Obviously if someone tried to build on land they don’t own then legal proceedings could be brought. But by that point the planning application would have been passed and the onus would be on neighbours to fund the legal dispute. And it’s hard to physically prevent someone from chopping down a tree, and you can’t exactly un-chop it again if the action is proved wrong. Surely planning officers should consider this, don’t they??

This is the declaration that must be signed by the applicant or their agent. It refers to land owned by someone else. This usually can be seen by the site plan and the land registry ownership plan. In our case it was very clear about who owned what. If the applicant has lied, you must call it out. In our case, the planners asked the applicant to prove they owned all the land they were proposing to build or had permission from the other owners. In other words was the declaration truthful? As it wasn’t, it easy withdrawn. Planners are not accountable to anyone so don’t expect help.

@PresentingPercy Wrong again. The applicants don't need permission from other land owners to submit an application. They just need to certify that they have notified any other owners that an application is being made.

If you mean Planning Officer's employed by a Local Authority, they are accountable to the Local Government Ombudsman if they have not followed correct procedure. You could also report to the professional body if they are Chartered Town Planners - the RTPI. But make sure you really know what the legislation says before doing this.

If you certify that you are the sole owner, on A, and you are not, this is a major issue. It is lying. It is interesting how defensive planners are. Not much help to anyone who feels their land is being taken! No wonder they get a bad press. However, whatever the rights and wrongs, I won. Application withdrawn. So whatever I did, I got what I wanted!

Percy if you look at the bottom of your screenshot it states that the planning applicant has to have served notice on the landowner. So they have to have officially said “I am applying for planning permission on your land”.

Not doing this causes a planning application to be invalid. So yes, certifying as a sole owner means they haven’t put in the right forms. But the only change they need to make is to actually put in the right forms. It doesn’t cost anything, it can’t be refused, it’s barely any delay.

And serving these forms on the landowner means that they can then apply for whatever planning they want, quite legally. I’ve been reading up on this! The landowner has no right to refuse an application for planning permission on their land. They can refuse the actual building work being done, but not the PP.

@Seeline

Are there valid planning reasons for objecting? If PP has already been refused (and dismissed at appeal?), any subsequent applications will have to overcome the previous reasons for refusal. Concentrate on those, along with any other planning issues that the revised scheme may bring up.

Yes, but none which feel as unassailable as “a thing 3m wide will not fit in a space 2m wide”. But yes, I think you are right and we should refocus our efforts. It feels very counter intuitive.

I would still point out to the planners that you dispute ownership of the land. It’s not a material reason for refusal but the planners are still human. If they can see it’s a contentious proposal then they’ll likely use any remotely reasonable excuse to refuse it, which they may not do otherwise.

This sounds identical to developer issues in my village right now🤔

Well, as I said, we got the application withdrawn. We did feel, in the end, the planning officer was not going to recommend approval for a building on land not owned by the applicant. It was clear the applicant had lied and there is supposed to be a max £5000 fine for this. As you can see, planners seem to ignore this. So get your arguments in place, look at the form and make a big effort with local councillors from tghe pkanning autrhority and parish council. A barrage of complaints can win over hearts and minds. You might be successful, as we were.