Allotment holders in third fight over ministerial approval for appropriation

Allotment holders are set to bring a third legal challenge after the Communities Secretary again approved plans for Watford Council to appropriate their site for a major housing and hospital expansion development.

In August 2013 the then Communities Secretary Eric Pickles conceded that his original decision to grant consent for appropriation of the allotments at Farm Terrace under s.8 of the Allotments Act 1925 was unlawful and should be quashed.

When Pickles took a fresh decision that building on the allotments in West Watford was in the public interest, the allotment holders brought a second challenge.

Mr Justice Ouseley upheld the challenge in October 2014, agreeing with the allotment holders that the council had failed to inform the Communities Secretary of a major change to the plans for the development that had been agreed before he took his decision.

On the latest legal challenge to a decision to grant approval for appropriation, law firm Deighton Pierce Glynn said: “The Secretary of State’s policy – which is designed to protect allotments from development – says that consent for appropriation should not be granted if the allotments are not surplus to requirements.

“The council admits that the allotments are not surplus to requirements, but maintains (and the Secretary of State agrees) that the need to build on the allotment land constitutes ‘exceptional circumstances' which justify building on it anyway, despite the fact that the development will go ahead without the allotments anyway.

“The allotment holders believe that if ‘exceptional circumstances’ are interpreted in this way, then no allotment in England is safe, because it would be so easy for developers to assert that their application is exceptional. The case will therefore be about far more than Farm Terrace, as it will affect every local authority-owned allotment site in the country.”

The law firm said a formal letter before claim was sent on 22 July to the Secretary of State and the council. They have until 5 August 2016 to respond.