Killian Garvey successfully represented Wellingborough Borough Council in a s.78 planning inquiry relating to 102 dwellings at 199 Northampton Road, Wellingborough, Northamptonshire after a 4 day inquiry.
The appeal was brought by Hampton Brook Ltd. It was pursued by an extremely well resourced team who fought hard. The main issues at the inquiry were: (1) do the Council have a 5 year housing land supply? (2) ecology (3) landscape and (4) planning.
The Council won on every area of dispute. This was a significant victory being that it was the first time since the adoption of the Council’s development plan that a developer had sought to challenge the Council’s assumptions on housing land supply.
Interestingly, the Council also won on the technical argument that, being that the s.106 was not signed by a chargee, it was not a properly executed legal agreement that the inspector could have regard for.
It was also a great comfort to the Council that many of the pivotal concessions and/or areas of attack from the cross-examination were all reflected within the inspector’s decision letter.
