Owner of ex-British Legion hall fails in tribunal bid to stop registration as asset of community value

The owner of a former British Legion Hall cannot prevent it from being designated as an asset of community value, the First-Tier Tribunal General Regulatory Chamber has ruled.

In Biggs v East Suffolk Council [2019] UKFTT CR-2019-0002 (GRC) Judge Moira Macmillan accepted the argument of East Suffolk Council that the hall’s recent disuse did not mean that it could never resume its role as an events venue in the village of Framlingham.

The hall was bought by a Ms Julie Biggs in 2018 but two months later Suffolk Coastal District Council - East Suffolk’s predecessor - decided to list it as an asset of community value on the nomination of Framlingham Community Baptist Church.

Ms Higgs challenged whether the hall met the listing criteria arguing that it had not in the recent past been used for activities that ‘furthered the social wellbeing or interests of the local community’ as it had scarcely been used for community events in nearly 10 years and had been boarded up for two years before she purchased it.

She further argued that there was no likelihood of the hall returning to community use in the next five years as she intended to live in it and had no intention of selling.

East Suffolk responded that the hall had been used consistently and regularly for community purposes until 2010 and on an occasional basis until 2016.

It took Ms Biggs’ intention not to sell the property into account but decided it was realistic to think that qualifying use of the hall for a community purpose could resume within the next five years because she might change her mind if she remained unable to obtain planning permission to change the permitted use to residential.

Judge Macmillan found the use of the hall until 2010 furthered the social wellbeing or interests of the community and that its more occasional use until 2016 continued this and amounted to use within the ‘recent past’.

She said: “Although [Ms Biggs] has no intention to do so at present, it is not fanciful to think that her views on selling the hall may change if she is unable to obtain planning permission to change the use.”

Dismissing the appeal, the judge concluded: “I find it is realistic to think that the church or another community group may seek to purchase the hall should the opportunity arise, with a view to reopening the premises as a community venue and that it could therefore return to such use within the next five years.”

Mark Smulian