Waverley Borough Council (20 005 548)
Category : Planning > Planning applications
Decision : Closed after initial enquiries
Decision date : 29 Oct 2020
The Ombudsman's final decision:
Summary: The Ombudsman will not investigate Mrs X’s complaint about the way the Council decided to grant permission for a neighbouring house extension. There is not enough evidence of fault by the Council in its planning decision, or in not deciding the application at its planning committee, to justify an Ombudsman investigation.
The complaint
- Mrs X lives next to a property where the neighbour applied for planning permission for a single-storey extension. Mrs X complains the Council failed to:
- take into account her objections to the application, and those of other parties, including the Town Council, when dealing with the planning application;
- conduct a site visit to her house;
- follow its Scheme of Delegation for deciding whether an application should be referred to the planning committee.
- Mrs X says the overbearing extension will cause loss of light and outlook from inside her house and in her garden. She wants the planning permission changed to mitigate some of the impact of the extension on her property. Mrs X also wants the Council to change its procedures, so applications are put before the planning committee where a planning officer is going against the recommendation of a statutory consultee.
The Ombudsman’s role and powers
- 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)
- We provide a free service, but must use public money carefully. We may decide not to start or continue with an investigation if we believe it is unlikely further investigation will lead to a different outcome. (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended)
How I considered this complaint
- As part of my assessment I have:
- considered the complaint and the documents provided by Mrs X;
- viewed relevant online planning documents and maps;
- issued a draft decision, inviting Mrs X to reply, and considered her response.
What I found
- Mrs X made written objections to the planning application. The Council took those objections into account when considering the application. The planning officer’s report summarises Mrs X’s concerns, and also the Town Council’s objection. The report sets out why the officer considers the proposed extension would not cause such harm to Mrs X’s property to justify a refusal decision.
- The planning officer’s report considers the proposed single-storey extension would be visible over the current boundary fence with Mrs X’s property and garden. Due to the lie of the land, the officer notes the visible part of the extension would be between 50cm and 80cm above the fence. In their professional judgement, the officer determined this amount of impact would not be overbearing or cause overshadowing to an extent warranting refusal of the application.
- The Town Council’s objection to the application referred to the local planning authority’s Neighbourhood Plan. The Town Council considered the application breached the plan because it had an unacceptable impact on Mrs X’s property, would be overdevelopment of the site, and used inappropriate materials. The officer’s report set out in the planning report why they considered the application did not breach the plan in these ways.
- I have not seen evidence of fault in the way the officer made their professional judgement decisions here. The officer was entitled to reach those views after conducting appropriate visits and assessments of the application. I realise Mrs X disagrees, but it is not fault for a council officer to properly make a decision with which someone disagrees.
- Mrs X considers the planning officer should not have determined the application without viewing the development site from her property. But an officer deciding not to conduct a site visit to the home of an objector is not fault. It is for planning officers to decide what information they need to make their assessment of the impacts of the proposed development on existing properties. This officer considered they could assess the impact of the extension on Mrs X’s property from other available locations, alongside the application, plans and maps. That was an assessment the officer was entitled to make.
- Mrs X considers the Council should have referred the application to her local ward member, who had objected to the application, and would have asked for it to be decided by the planning committee.
- The Council says, unlike some other councils, there is no requirement for its planning officers to consult the local ward members and the Town or Parish Council if they are minded to approve an application and the Town or Parish Council has asked for the application to be refused. The Council’s Scheme of Delegation says officers will invite local ward members to ask for an application to go before the planning committee where five or more objections are received, or there are considered to be other planning reasons for the application to be determined by committee. The number of objections received for this application did not meet the threshold for a referral to the ward members. There is not enough evidence of fault in the way the Council applied its delegation policy and process here to warrant investigation.
- Even if there has been fault by the Council on this issue, the Ombudsman could only make a finding that Mrs X had lost an opportunity to present her objections to a committee. I do not consider the Ombudsman could say on balance that if the application had been referred to the ward member, who then requested it to go before the committee, that the committee would have made a different decision on the application.
- I recognise Mrs X wants the Council to change its delegation policies to be in line with other councils which deal with call-ins to their planning committee differently. But the Ombudsman would not make a finding of fault where a council has followed its own properly adopted policy.
Final decision
- The Ombudsman will not investigate this complaint. This is because there is not enough evidence of fault by the Council in the way it reached its planning decision, or in the way it applied its adopted Scheme of Delegation, to warrant an Ombudsman investigation.
Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman