A recent CIL appeal decision (heavily redacted as always) highlights the sometimes overlooked interaction between planning considerations and potential liability under The Community Infrastructure Regulations 2010.
There still seems to be a residual misconception amongst some that buildings that are redundant have a better prospect of receiving planning consent for conversion to alternatives uses, including to dwellings, than buildings that are well maintained and in active use. For that reason, there may be a temptation to stress the dilapidated and redundant nature of buildings when making submissions for planning consent for a change of use under Class Q or otherwise.
The CIL appeal concerned buildings that had previously been a pig farm and were described in an application for Class Q prior approval as being redundant and last used before the applicant purchased the property.
The Class Q approval was granted and the local planning authority calculated the CIL liability on the total area of the new dwellings with no offset for any “in use” area of the existing buildings based on what had been said in the planning application. The applicants appealed that decision on a number of grounds and provided submissions from their planning consultant and others that, contrary to what had been said in the application, the buildings were in fact in use for a small scale animal rescue operation that included using the buildings to house the animals and for storage of animal feed and bedding.
The appeal was successful but may have been avoided in the first place if the applicants and/or those advising them and been more familiar with the CIL regulations and had framed the Class Q application submissions differently.
