Summary: Mr X complained about the Council’s decision to approve the change of use of a building next to his home. There was no fault in the way the Council made its decision.

The complaint

1. Mr X complained about the Council’s decision to approve a planning application for the change of use of an agricultural building into residential accommodation.
2. Mr X says the development will affect his privacy, devalue his house and affect other properties in the Conservation Area.
3. Mr X also complained about the Council’s response to his formal complaint.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

4. 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)
5. 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

6. I read the complaint and invited Mr X to discuss it with me. I read the Council’s response to the complaint and considered documents from its planning files, including the plans and the case officer’s report.
7. I gave Mr X and the Council an opportunity to comment on a draft of this decision and took account of the comments I received.

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What I found

Planning law and guidance

8. Councils should approve planning applications that accord with policies on the local development plan unless other material planning considerations indicate they should not.
9. Planning considerations include things like:
• access to the highway;
• protection of ecological and heritage assets; and
• the impact on neighbouring amenity.
10. Planning considerations do not include things like:
• views over another’s land;
• the impact of development on property value; and
• private rights and interests in land.
11. Councils may impose planning conditions to make development acceptable in planning terms. Conditions should be necessary, enforceable and reasonable in all other regards.
12. Planning permission is usually required to change from one class to another. Legislation states that land used for agriculture or forestry should not be considered to be development, though farm buildings and other structures might require planning consent.
13. Not all development requires planning permission from local planning authorities. Certain developments are deemed permitted, providing they fall within limits set within regulations. This type of development is known as ‘permitted development’.
14. Some permitted development proposals require an application so the council can decide whether it can or should control certain parts of the development, such as design and materials issues or access to the highway. These applications are known as ‘prior notification’ applications.
15. The purpose of the case officer report is not merely to facilitate the decision, but to demonstrate the decisions were properly made and due process followed. Without an adequate report, we cannot know whether the Council took proper account of the key material planning considerations or whether judgements were affected by irrelevant matters.
16. However, the courts have made it clear that:
• case officer reports do not need to be perfect, as their intended audience are the parties to the application (the Council and the applicant) who are well versed of the issues; and
• case officer reports do not need to include every possible planning consideration, but just the principle controversial issues.

What happened

17. Mr X lives next to a barn. The owner of the barn (the developer) had planning permission and listed building consent to convert it to residential use, but the permissions expired because a pre-commencement condition was not discharged before the commencement date.
18. Because of this, the developer had to re-apply for planning permission.
19. The application was considered by a planning case officer, who wrote a report setting out recommendations on the main issues. The case officer’s report included:
• a description of the proposal and site;
• a summary of relevant planning history;
• comments from neighbours and other consultees;
• relevant planning policy and guidance;
• an appraisal of the main planning considerations, including impact on heritage assets, neighbouring amenity and highway safety; and
• the officer’s recommendation to approve the application, subject to planning conditions.
20. The Council approved the application subject to planning conditions.
21. Mr X said the way the Council dealt with the application and the complaint he made about it, was unprofessional.

My findings

22. We are not a planning appeal body. Our role is to review the process by which planning decisions are made. We look for fault in the decision-making process, and when we find it, we decide whether it caused an injustice to the complainant.
23. Mr X would have preferred the report to have covered more details of relevant policy, but the amount of detail and focus of the report is a matter of judgement for the Council to decide. In my view, there is enough issue to show that the main issues were considered.
24. Mr X said the way the Council dealt with him was unprofessional. It is not our role to judge the performance of councils against good practice measures. Our role is simply to review the process by which decisions are made.
25. In this case, the Council considered planning policy, the application plans, the planning history of the site and other material planning considerations, including the impact on neighbouring amenity, before it made its decision. The Council followed the decision-making process we would expect and so we cannot say there was fault.
26. I did not investigate Mr X’s complaint about the Council’s handling of his formal complaint. We do not routinely investigate complaints about complaints procedures. There are several reasons for this, but in summary, the main reasons are as follows.
27. We investigate whether a significant injustice is caused by fault in the Council’s decision-making process. If complainants are unhappy with a council’s response or lack of response to a complaint, we can review how the council dealt with the original and substantive issues that caused concern. We are a stage beyond the Council’s own complaints processes and can remedy any injustice it has failed to address.
28. Generally, it is not a good use of public resources to investigate complaints about complaint procedures, if we are unable to deal with the substantive issue. If we find no fault or significant injustice, or the issue is outside our remit, investigation into side issues is unlikely to result in a remedy or a meaningful outcome.

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Final decision

29. I completed my investigation because there was no fault in the decision-making process.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman