Court of Appeal to hear appeal this week from council over use of hotel to accommodate asylum seekers

In November last year Mr Justice Mould dismissed the council’s application for a final injunction in Epping Forest District Council v Somani Hotels Ltd [2025] EWHC 2937 (KB).

This was despite the High Court judge finding that Epping Forest had a reasonable basis for its view that the current use of the hotel requires planning permission and is therefore in breach of planning control.

Mr Justice Mould ultimately concluded that the claim was not a case "in which it is just and convenient for this court to grant an injunction".

He said: "I give due respect to the Claimant's judgment that the current use of the Bell as contingency accommodation for asylum seekers constitutes a material change in the use of those premises which requires planning permission.

"Nevertheless, I have not been persuaded that an injunction is a commensurate response to that postulated breach of planning control."

He said the breach was "far from being flagrant", adding that the planning and environmental harm caused by the hotel's current use was "limited".

The need for hotels as an important element of supply and contingency for the Home Office's asylum accommodation programme was meanwhile a "significant counterbalancing factor", the judgment said.

Mould J's conclusion was limited to the determination of the council's application for an injunction pursuant to section 187N of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990.

He said that it remained open to the claimant to consider the expediency of taking enforcement action by issuing and enforcement notice.

"It is also open to the defendant [Somani Hotels] to reconsider whether it would be appropriate to apply for retrospective planning permission or to apply to the council for a certification of lawfulness of the existing use of the Bell pursuant to section 191 of the 1990 Act.

"Each of those possible courses of action would enable the planning issues raised by this case to be evaluated by the local planning authority, through the transparent and consultative decision-making processes with public participation which apply under the 1990 Act and its attendant regulations.”

A private meeting of full council on 25 November saw Epping Forest decide to appeal Mould J’s decision.

The council's leader, Chris Whitbread, told the BBC that a "strong majority" of councillors voted to continue proceedings.

In its appeal the district council is seeking to restrain the continued use of the Bell Hotel for accommodating asylum seekers and to obtain declaratory relief that such use is not “use as a hotel”.

Epping Forest had secured an interim injunction in August 2025 from Mr Justice Eyre amid protests in Epping over the hotel’s use.

Later that month the Court of Appeal allowed appeals by Somani Hotel against the interim injunction and by the Home Secretary against an order refusing to join her as a party to these proceedings.

The Supreme Court then refused Epping Forest’s application for permission to appeal the decision to allow the Home Office to join as an intervener in the main claim. A three-justice panel decided that the council's application did not raise “an arguable point of law of general importance".