The Planning Inspectorate says Harrow Borough Council “acted unreasonably” during a long-running dispute with Barnet FC over the Hive stadium.

The council has been told it will now have to reimburse Barnet FC for costs it accrued preparing to appeal the authority’s planning enforcement notice for the stadium floodlights and west stand.

Harrow Council issued the notice last year after its planning committee turned down retrospective proposals for the stadium.

However Barnet FC appealed and in April this year the council backed out, saying it would not fight the appeal case.

The Planning Inspectorate ordered Harrow Council to pay the club’s legal fees in a report made public on Friday.

The report, which sets out the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government's reasons for the decision, said: “The council’s investigations were not sufficiently rigorous or conclusive.

It adds: “It is difficult for the Secretary of State not to conclude that by its withdrawal of the enforcement notice the council has effectively conceded that it does not have ‘reasonable' grounds for considering it ‘expedient’ to have issued it in the first place.

“The Secretary of State takes the view the council acted unreasonably.

“While he accepts that the council's decision to withdraw the enforcement notice will have minimised the parties' cost of attending the arranged inquiry, the practical consequences of the council’s actions were that the appellants incurred the unnecessary and wasted expense of appealing against an enforcement notice that was later withdrawn."

It is not yet known how much the council will have to pay.