Campaign groups call for public to have limited right of appeal over planning decisions

Two leading campaign groups have called for the government to create a new, limited public right of appeal against planning decisions.

The Campaign to Protect Rural England (CPRE) and the Environmental Law Foundation (ELF) urged ministers not to pull a U-turn on their promise to rebalance rights of appeal in the planning process.

A public right of appeal already exists in Australia, New Zealand and Ireland, they said. In most cases, this right allows community groups to put their case against a planning decision without having to employ lawyers and being exposed to the risk of being billed for the other side’s costs.

The groups argued that the current system is weighted too heavily in favour of developers. “The only way for local people to question bad development granted planning permission is in the High Court, neither a cheap nor expedient option,” they said.

The CPRE and the ELF said their proposed new right of appeal was vital if the Big Society was going to deliver a bigger role for local people in the planning decisions that affect them, without the risk of going to court.

The organisations have also published a guide, Plan B: how to challenge bad developments in court, explaining how members of the public can bring legal action.

Paul Miner, senior planning campaigner at the CPRE, said: “The Big Society should be about having stronger rights and more affordable remedies to counter bad planning decisions. Going all the way to the High Court for local issues is just ridiculous. It’s often risky, expensive and should strictly be a last resort.

“A limited public right of planning appeal doesn’t stop all new development as some claim. But developers will have to meaningfully negotiate with local communities to ensure that development happens.”

The ELF’s chief executive, Debbie Tripley, pointed out that the UK had signed up to the Aarhus Convention, which conferred obligations with respect to providing environmental information to the public, public participation in decision-making processes and access to a system of environmental justice that is not prohibitively expensive.

“Citizens have the right to be involved in environmental decision-making but without public right of appeal, this has had little or no impact on ordinary members of the public,” she said.