Wakefield City Council (18 019 823)

Category : Planning > Planning applications

Decision : Not upheld

Decision date : 11 Jul 2019

The Ombudsman's final decision:

Summary: Mr X complained the Council failed to notify him about a planning application and did not consider his amenity before granting permission. There is no evidence of fault in the way the Council followed regulatory and policy process.

The complaint

  1. Mr X complained the Council failed to make him aware of a planning application for a change of use for a building situated near his home.
  2. Mr X says the view from his property has been negatively affected by the application and he is unhappy about this.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

  1. We investigate complaints of injustice caused by ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’. I have used the word ‘fault’ to refer to these. We cannot question whether a council’s decision is right or wrong simply because the complainant disagrees with it. We must consider whether there was fault in the way the decision was reached. (Local Government Act 1974, section 34(3), as amended)
  2. If we are satisfied with a council’s actions or proposed actions, we can complete our investigation and issue a decision statement. (Local Government Act 1974, section 30(1B) and 34H(i), as amended)

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How I considered this complaint

  1. I spoke to Mr X and discussed his view of the complaint.
  2. I made enquiries of the Council and considered the information it provided.
    This included email and letter correspondence between Mr X and the Council.
  3. I reviewed the Council’s planning policy and Statement of Community Involvement.
  4. I gave the Council and Mr X the opportunity to comment on my draft decision.

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What I found

Planning regulations and Council policy

  1. Councils are required to give publicity to planning applications. The publicity required depends on the nature of the development, although in all cases the application must be published on the Council’s website.
  2. As well as regulatory minimum requirements, councils must also produce a Statement of Community Involvement (SCI). The SCI sets out the Council’s policy on how it will communicate with the public when it carries out its functions. It is not unusual for the SCI to commit councils to do more than the minimum legal requirements, for example, to put up a site notice and to serve notice on adjoining owners or occupiers.
  3. In this case, the requirement on the Council was to either put up a site notice or to send neighbour notification letters

Background

  1. In 2018, the Council approved a planning application for a business facility to be built near to Mr X’s home.
  2. The Council says it erected site notices informing residents about the development in the month before it decided the application in 2018. The Council has provided a map showing approximate areas near Mr X’s home where it placed the notices.

What happened

  1. Mr X became aware of the planning application around three months after the Council granted permission. He complained to the Council that he had not been notified and asked it to explain what it had done to publicise the planning application.
  2. The Council replied and said it had placed site notices on lampposts near Mr X’s home for 21 days in the month prior to considering the application.
  3. Mr X disputed this and asked the Council to provide photographic evidence showing where the site notices were posted and how long they were in place.
  4. The Council responded at Stage 1 of its complaints process and confirmed its systems showed it had generated five notices. The Council also confirmed the officer responsible for erecting site notices had recorded posting the notices. The Council was unable to provide photographic evidence of this.
  5. Mr X was not satisfied with this response and asked the Council to escalate his complaint to Stage 2.
  6. An independent investigator reviewed the complaint at Stage 2 and found the Council had satisfied its statutory responsibility to place site notices in and around the area 21 days prior to approving the planning application.
  7. Mr X continued to dispute this and referred the complaint to us.

My findings

  1. The Council has checked its records and confirmed a Council officer posted several site notices near Mr X’s home in the month before the application was decided. The Council also provided a location map showing roughly where it placed the site notices. I do not dispute that Mr X did not see the notices but on the balance of probability, I accept the Council fulfilled its obligation to post the notices. There was no fault in the Council’s actions.
  2. Mr X states the Council did not place the notices in areas he could easily access. The Council’s policy does not specify exact locations it should place the site notices, only that it places them in the local area. The Council has confirmed it posted the site notices in several areas around the development. There was no fault in the Council’s actions.
  3. Mr X is unhappy the Council could not provide photographic evidence of the site notices it had posted. There are no regulatory or policy standards requiring the Council to take photographs of posted site notices. I do not find fault with the Council’s actions.
  4. I cannot hold the Council responsible for the fact neither Mr X nor his neighbour saw the notices posted by the Council.
  5. Neither Council policy nor regulatory guidance requires the Council to ensure each local resident has seen the site notices. It is only required to ensure it posts the site notices for the required timescales. I am satisfied the Council has met this requirement and acted in line with its policy.

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Final decision

  1. I have completed my investigation. There is no evidence of fault in the way the Council followed its process to publicise the planning application.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman

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