oxo

Just a quick update to my special friends here - mr Punter was spot on as mr Nasty got to his senses and withdrew from JR. We are building again. Any advice on how to (legally) annoy mr Nasty after everything he put us through - would be really appreciated keeping count of virtual Champagne credits 🤩

no wonder you are called Mr Punter ?

maybe this will help - Following consideration of the documents lodged by the Claimant Order by Maggie XXX, Planning Court Lawyer (in exercise of powers delegated by the President of the Queen’s Bench Division pursuant to CPR Part 54.1A) IT IS HEREBY ORDERED 1. The Claimant shall file Form N208PC (Planning Court Statutory Review Claim Form) in substitution for the N461PC Judicial Review Claim Form within 7 days of receipt of this Order. 2. The Claimant shall pay the balance of fee in the sum of £415 due in respect of this application for Statutory Review within 7 days of receipt of this Order (fee payable for Statutory Review being £569). 3. The Claimant shall show the Secretary of State for Levelling-Up, Housing and Communities as the 1st Defendant in place of The Planning Inspectorate; The London Borough of Hammersmith and Fulham as the 2nd Defendant; and oxo as the 3rd Defendants. 4. The Claimant shall serve a copy of Form N208PC and a copy of the bundle of documentation in support on the 1st Defendant at Government Legal Department, 102 Petty France, London, SW1H 9GL and on the 2nd Defendant at the address of the Council’s Legal Department. 5. The Claimant shall serve a copy of the Form N208PC on the 3rd Defendants, oxo, within 14 days of receipt of this order in substitution for any judicial review claim form served on them together with the documentation in support.

but you are right - we were not asked to stop the build, just thinking why our planner thinks we must wait - will investigate further

Actually the council refused us, so they will probably be pleased to see JR thinking "I told you so oxo" We got planning on appeal by the Secretary of State's Inspector decision - which came quicker than we thought and where all council's objections were listed as 'unconvincing' - inspector wasn't mincing her words against mr evil's objections either Secretary of State are the 1st defendant now, council is now 2nd (not sure why they would bother with it at all but as Temp here says it's because they must enforce our appeal - they may choose to participate in defence, but I wouldn't count on them as reliable dendendant - they rejected our permission) We became 3rd defendant through court order (claimant only listed us as interested party) - effectively we were 'upgraded' by the JR's lawyer from interested party to defendant probably because they know that council won't bother and the Secretary Of State - we are told - don't like to litigate and they would rather agree to their decision being quashed and go to re-run our appeal with yet another inspector (whilst addressing whatever unknown mistakes they may have made) we are looking for many months delay here and if we eventually lose properly (i.e. appeal/application will be quashed completely) - all that we built now (according to the planner's view) - may be asked to be demolished. however insane this may sound as Adsibob says. basically we are stuck by the sound of it and need to wait for 2 weeks to see what the procedural grounds mr Evil is relying on ? just when I started to plan a beauty parade of drainage beauticians ?

interesting thought thank you but what would we be requesting and from who - from the LA who refused planning or the Inspector who allowed planning?

just had a consultation with the planning advisor who got our appeal through - he's no wiser what the basis of the order from the claimant side and we just have to wait for 2 weeks to receive all his papers ? apparently due to the fact that the order reached us and mentioned "to remedy procedural defect" of not addressing the right defendants in the first place - we are not able to throw it out but we are going to have a more legally minded mind to consider the background for now. more costs unavoidable it seems ? but I was so much more prepared for this call thanks to all your comments and learning - this is like a university here, loving it, more virtual Champagne to you all ? maybe one day the real stuff too ??

Yey thank you - I know it from an hour ago ? he served it on 4.2, which is 6 weeks to the day from 24.12 and they sent to us today which is 3 days later

It says in the order he had to pay some £600 fee to register it. But if it all goes to hearing - there must be few more thousands I would think?

He did it right on the day of 6-week expiry. He is a property developer and well versed in planning objections etc

I am surprised the council is named defendant. Council refused us planning on the basis of neighbour’s 90-page objection letter so the only defendant here should be the Inspector who dismissed all council’s and neighbour’s objections as unconvincing and granted us the permission. Why would council be asked to defend appeal if they were against permission in the first place? Unless the issue is something procedural that they have done something which allowed our appeal to succeed without them planning on it? Thank you for all the links, very helpful and another twist and turn on our poor wee hours and more research hours and probably bills ?

I just dug out some numbers (love numbers) - only 2.5% of JRs are won by claimants (2018).. that's a high bar - wonder what he's thinking - bluff is already costing him in fees - he must know something we don't ?

In the High Court of Justice CO Ref: Queen’s Bench Division CO/415/2022 Planning Court Administrative Court In the matter of an application for Statutory Review pursuant to s.288 of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990 PAUL EVIL OBJECTING NEIGHBOUR versus (1) THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR LEVELLING UP, HOUSING AND COMMUNITIES (2) LONDON BOROUGH OF HAMMERSMITH AND FULHAM (3) OXO On the Court making an order of its own initiative – CPR part 3.3(4 The Claimant shall file Form N208PC (Planning Court Statutory Review Claim Form) in substitution for the N461PC Judicial Review Claim Form within 7 days of receipt of this Order Reasons: The Claimant acting in person has lodged this claim by way of judicial review on 04 February 2022. However, the only means by which the validity of a decision made on appeal under s.78 of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990 may be challenged is by way of statutory review under s.288 of the 1990 Act. By Civil Procedure Rules, Practice Direction 8C, paragraph 4.1, the defendants are the minister of the appropriate government department and the authority directly concerned with the decision. The Claimant has named The Planning Inspectorate as the 1st Defendant and oxo as Interested Parties. However, the Planning Inspectorate is an executive agency of the Ministry of Levelling-Up, Housing and Communities and there is no provision for “interested parties” to be joined to claims brought under CPR Part 8. In this case, the correct defendants are the Secretary of State for Levelling-Up, Housing and Communities, the London Borough of Hammersmith and Fulham and OXO. This Order is made to remedy the procedural defects.

hello old friends - here we are back with some update ? the neighbour who objected to our planning application (which we got approved on appeal and about to start our build) - is now taking his claim to the High Court to review the appeal's decision. any thought what that means for our finances and our project to get a home we've been waiting (to start) for 3 years now?

merry Christmas old friends! Just wanted to update that today we heard we won on our planning appeal against LBHF, and decision could not read as more helpful and supportive - all planners' arguments were dismissed as 'unconvincing' and both extensions can now go ahead ! Wanted to thank everybody for offering constructive and useful advice - probably would not have had the conviction to face the appeal route without you here - THANK YOU! Now on to the next challenge - to build it (without breaking the bank) ? Will be checking back in for more useful knowledge sending virtual Champagne to everyone (if it's your thing)

Massive thank you to all friends here for breaking it down for me and good reference. So much to learn ? Can I just check buttercup - the green wall was not part of the planning application and refusal. Are you suggesting we appeal whilst also run with the new green wall application in parallel? Or is it possible to propose a condition on us to include green wall and move windows to the back - as part of the appeal process?

that's right, 2 extensions of about 150 sq ft in total, with the side wall flush with the existing ground floor the map looks like this - yellow arrows point to our building, and the yellow line is the tiny footpath - only residents of the square would use it to get to the main street north bound, hardly anyone walks there, most people arrive/leave by car red blocks are other end of terraces, which are all extended, you can see below their extensions facing our side wall is open space, trees, some parking - we are not the focal point of the square, the open spaces are everywhere. looking at it from proportions point point of view - we are a tiny drop in the ocean, surrounded by much taller neighbours (directly behind us is the one who objected). Massive new redevelopments to the north, east and south from our building they allowed this on end of terrace 1 and this at the other end 2

like your ideas thank you! we thought of the wall setback and green feature as option2 for the application but the structural costs would be a lot higher so we didn't apply for it in the end. worth considering if all else fails with the appeal - it could look very pretty indeed. But that would mean moving the window to the back wall and overlooking the neighbour again ?

planning report said they didn't do site visit due to Covid

the roof is not very flat and is matching the pattern of all other backs (14 of us), which are all butterflies (I'm told they are called), except one flat who escaped planning scrutiny and sneaked what they fancied.. ? do you think this could work - with a green living wall feature ? could look striking but not safe by more sonservative accounts..

we have 6m front garden outside space, and we have 5.5m rare outside space and we are only asking for 1.4m - hopefully we are withing 'less than half' overall?

here we go.. sigh... (1) The proposed single storey rear extension is considered to be unacceptable in the interests of visual amenity and loss of amenity space. More particularly, the proposed rear extension, combined with the existing back addition, by reason of its resultant scale and depth would introduce an overdominant rear extension failing to respect the character and appearance of the subject property, and in turn would adversely reduce the size of the garden and affect the existing sense of openness. Furthermore, the application site is constrained by containing a narrow, irregular rear garden compared to other buildings along the same terrace, the result of which would be a cumulative harm to the character and appearance of the conservation area. In this respect the proposal would be contrary to Local Plan (2018) Policies xxx, as well as SPD Key Principle xxx of the Planning Guidance Supplementary Planning Document (2018). -- this is the 1.4m ground floor extension that the officer didn't have an issue with in pre-planning stage. Also 'loss of amenity space' is strange because we would be gaining valuable family space on the ground floor that the house otherwise lacks. We'd still retain reasonable (for London) garden, and our garden is only marginally less deep, by some 0.5m compared to others, but by being end of terrace and openly west facing - our garden aspect is a lot brighter than others so a small reduction in its depth would not matter, especially when the trade off is a better internal amenity space - all in glass so bringing outside to the inside.. (2) The proposed first floor level rear extension would have a detrimental impact on the established historic pattern of local terrace houses, as the additional bulk would result in a two storey height flank wall on the boundary of a public footpath, which would create an oppressive sense of enclosure to the route, that the existing set back respects. The proposal would therefore harm the character and appearance of the xx Conservation Area which is not outweighed by the public benefits of the scheme. The proposal would therefore result in an unacceptable impact upon the Conservation Area which it is desirable to preserve in accordance with s.72 of the Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) Act 1990. This is contrary to Policy xxx of the Local Plan (2018), Key Principles xxx of the Planning Guidance Supplementary Planning Document (2018). -- 'the established historic pattern' is such that we are the only house on our side of the street that didn't have 1st floor extended, including 3 other end of terraces. We were aiming to continue the current existing pattern and bring it in line and homogenous consistency - both of our heritage expert and planning adviser totally agreed on that. Also the public path was not historic, it was created much much later, and it's not used by many people as it's a tiny shortcut from the square to a bigger street and a pub. We were to match all brick work and restore original decorative bits below the roof line (forgot the name), which was lost (3) The proposed first floor level extension is considered to be unacceptable in the interests of residential amenity. More particularly, the depth and bulk of the first floor level extension and its close proximity to neighbouring residential properties, results in an overbearing and dominating effect for the residents of the neighbouring properties located in the opposing terrace at 9 xx. This results in loss of outlook and an increased sense of enclosure from windows located to the rear of 9 xx. Accordingly, the first floor level extension constitutes an overdominant, inappropriate and un-neighbourly form of development and in this respect is contrary to Policies xx of the Local Plan (2018) and Key Principle HS6 of the Planning Guidance Supplementary Planning Document (2018). -- we are talking about extending half width of the building out to the existing line of the other half - 'increased sense of enclosure' would not stand to scrutiny, especially that there was no site visit and the extent of the extension is disproportionally small in relation to what's in the square and the area and the fact that #9 is already so overtowring us and was a much later addition to the area - suddenly they gain total prominence in their exaggeration. ?

The same neighbour wrote on 2 pages how he objects to our house becoming larger because there would be shortage of smaller less expensive houses in the area for the families to buy. his own property is twice the size/height and value! So whatever we do to increase ours to create more space for ourselves - he will be against by the look of his lengthy objection essay. Hard to imagine how to get such character on board - more and more inclined to be working with a more reasonable appeal officer who unlike our LA planner will actually visit the site to see how our proposal can make things better and not worse. the comments here are clarifying so many things for me, it's great, want to hug everyone ?

thank you for all the comments, they are giving us strength ? we did speak to the officer at the first attempt at application. he even said they had no issue with the ground floor extension, which was documented by our planning consultant on email to us. we then withdrew to make changes to the first floor based on the objection - we moved one of the windows to the side and obscured the new bathroom window not to overlook the neighbour. but the decision and the new objection were still saying that we would be directly overlooking the objector - big inaccuracy there. we were also surprised that the decision was against the ground floor after all, despite the office not having an issue with it before as per the email mentioned above. and we definitely won't be skimming it on the appeal advisor but to find an expert is proving difficult, we'd like them to be local expert in SW6 London, but not found it yet - if there is such person here - would LOVE to hear from them ? will try and post the decision text later, just reading it makes me want to cry, just feels so unfair ?