No wonder I'm losing my hair (From Times Series)

No wonder I'm losing my hair

3:22pm Wednesday 4th July 2007

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I have just had a bizarre conversation with one of our excellent planning enforcement officers. We have an ongoing problem with a resident building structures alongside the main house. The house is in a conservation area so the structures are unsuitable and unauthorised. So far so good.

The Council has successfully taken enforcement action (the planning inspector has upheld the Councils refusal of planning permission) but the resident has now gone to the High Court to try and overturn the Inspector’s (and so the Council’s decision). It may take up to a year for the case to be heard! Oh, there are three more planning refusals also wending their way through to the Inspector and undoubtedly the High Court.

Just another routine day in the life of a planning enforcement officer I thought. However, I casually asked about the business use these new structures were being used for and who licensed them. ‘We do Councillor’ – so why are we granting a licence to operate a business in an unauthorised structure I asked (or words to that effect!).

Well apparently if the premises are fit for purpose (even if they don’t have planning consent and are unauthorised and subject to enforcement action) we have to grant the licence – otherwise the Council will be sued by the business operator (i.e. the same resident that the Council is seeking to get to toe the line on planning). At this point I was tempted to start banging my head against the desk. No wonder I’m losing my hair (that’s my excuse and I’m sticking to it). Has the world gone mad when the law and the attached regulations prevent the Council acting in a joined up manner? No wonder the resident is laughing at us all the way to the High Court.