“4.1 Where the proposed development conflicts with the housing settlement policies of the Council it does not accord with the development plan taken as a whole. However, officers consider that there are other material considerations which direct that planning permission should nevertheless be granted, not least through acknowledging that such policies are inconsistent with the NPPF and where the underlying aims of those policies would be otherwise met. It is acknowledged that the proposal does cause some tension between what is expected in terms of a constraint on future development within Thurston as envisaged in the Thurston Neighbourhood Plan and what is clearly a sustainable development proposal in line with the NPPF. 4.2 Whilst the Neighbourhood Plan includes expansion of the village envelope this is to embrace sites that have already been granted planning permission. The Neighbourhood Plan does not identify [allocate] sites for future expansion and this conflicts with the direction of travel in the Draft Joint Local Plan. The District Council as local plan making authority has indicated a requirement to allocate the application site [and others] for residential development. This application conforms with that objective and will help to meet the identified requirement for Thurston during the Plan period up to 2036. 4.3 This proposal delivers a raft of benefits chief of which is a package of highway improvements south of Thurston Railway Bridge that will have village wide [and beyond] benefits in terms of highway safety and ease of access. These works are identified in the Thurston neighbourhood Plan as being key to future development. This proposal represents the best way of securing the improvements because no other applicant has controlled sufficient land to make them possible [including the Thurston Five]. Suffolk County Council as local highway authority has indicated that it is not in a position to deliver the package of improvements. Consequently when exercising the tilted balance these highway works alone significantly tip the balance in favour of supporting the proposal. When all the benefits are taken into account the adverse impact of permitting another 210 dwellings in Thurston is outweighed. 4.4 On that basis the Committee is recommended to GRANT planning permission subject to a S106 Agreement to secure the matters identified earlier and conditions.”
“In the interests of protecting the existing character and appearance of the countryside, outside settlement boundaries there will be strict control over proposals for new housing. The provision of new housing will normally form part of existing settlements.”
“In the countryside development will be restricted to defined categories in accordance with other Core Strategy policies.”
“To develop and sustain the key service centre status of Thurston by ensuring any future development is sustainable and supports a range of employment, services and housing.”
“The Babergh and Mid Suffolk emerging Joint Local Plan is required to provide for significant levels of housing growth in order to address the identified needs of the two districts over the Plan period to 2036. … Thurston’s status as a proposed ‘core village’ means that it will play a key role in addressing that.”
“The granting of planning permission for a series of large sites in late 2017 has meant that there are over 1,000 dwellings in the planning pipeline for Thurston, i.e. with planning permission but not yet built or occupied. It is for the Joint Local Plan to ultimately address the objectively assessed housing need of the two districts over the period to 2036 and also to determine Thurston’s contribution to that. Given (i) the levels of growth in the planning pipeline; (ii) the fundamental concerns of the Suffolk County Council Highways Team about highway capacity; and (iii) the need to deliver major new education infrastructure in the form of a larger primary school on a new site, it is not expected that significant additional growth will need to be planned for in Thurston to support the emerging Joint Local Plan. In light of this, the spatial strategy seeks to be more restrictive as to the types of development which can be brought forward outside the settlement boundary, in line with Mid Suffolk Core Strategy Policies CS1 and CS2. In order to reflect a positive approach however, it is considered appropriate to provide some flexibility to address particularly significant needs identified in Thurston. Specifically, this relates to the needs of the ageing population which is discussed in more detail in Section 5 and reflected in Policy 2(B) and Policy 3. The provision of bungalows, sheltered housing and care facilities outside the settlement boundary will be viewed favourably (with more weight being given to proposals that are adjacent to the boundary as opposed to being clearly separate from it). Such proposals would have to demonstrate that there are no other suitable sites within the settlement boundary that are available or deliverable.”
“Therefore, the general approach in the Thurston Neighbourhood Plan is that growth will be focused on the sites with planning permission (which are located within the amended settlement boundary) and on small scale infill sites within the settlement boundary.”
“… the Neighbourhood Plan’s policies identify the issues that future development should address and provide criteria to ensure these are achieved. These policies shall also apply, where relevant, to the sites recently granted outline planning permission but without reserved matters approval. Over the lifetime of the Neighbourhood Plan, and providing infrastructure limitations can be overcome, housing growth could potentially be accommodated in a sensitive way within the parish. Such development would be tailored to address the housing needs of each sector of the population and would help meet the housing objectives identified in the BMSDC’s Joint Local Plan.”
“where there are no relevant development plan policies, or the policies which are most important for determining the application are out-of-date, granting permission unless: i. the application of policies in this Framework that protect areas or assets of particular importance provides a clear reason for refusing the development proposed; or ii. any adverse impacts of doing so would significantly and demonstrably outweigh the benefits, when assessed against the policies in this Framework taken as a whole.”
“where the presumption (at paragraph 11d) applies applies to applications involving the provision of housing, the adverse impact of allowing development that conflicts with the neighbourhood plan is likely to significantly and demonstrably outweigh the benefits, provided all of the following apply: (a) The neighbourhood plan became part of the development plan two years or less before the date on which the decision is made; (b) The neighbourhood plan contains policies and allocations to meet its identified housing requirement; (c) The local planning authority has at least a three year supply of deliverable housing sites (against its five year housing supply requirement, including the appropriate buffer as set out in paragraph 74); and (d) The local planning authority’s housing delivery was at least 45% of that required over the previous three years.”
“If regard is to be had to the development plan for the purpose of any determination to be made under the planning Acts the determination must be made in accordance with the plan unless material considerations indicate otherwise.”
“… the development plan is– (a) the regional strategy for the region in which the area is situated (if there is a regional strategy for that region), ... (b) the development plan documents (taken as a whole) which have been adopted or approved in relation to that area, and (c) the neighbourhood development plans which have been made in relation to that area.”
“A ‘neighbourhood development plan’ is a plan which sets out policies (however expressed) in relation to the development and use of land in the whole or any part of a particular neighbourhood area specified in the plan.”
“A development plan document is a local development document which is specified as a development plan document in the local development scheme.”
“If to any extent a policy contained in a development plan for an area conflicts with another policy in the development plan the conflict must be resolved in favour of the policy which is contained in the last document to become part of the development plan.”
“15. The general principles governing judicial review of a decision by a local planning authority to grant planning permission were summarised by Lindblom LJ in R (Mansell) v Tonbridge and Malling Borough Council[2019] PTSR 1452 at [42]. He held that an officer’s report to committee is not to be read with undue rigour, but with reasonable benevolence, bearing in mind that it is addressed to an informed readership, a planning committee, with substantial background and local knowledge (see also R (Palmer) v Herefordshire Council[2017] 1 WLR 411 at [8]). … 16. In R v Mendip District Council ex parte Fabre[2017] PTSR 1112 Sullivan J (as he then was) stated at [81] that, unlike a decision letter by a planning inspector, the purpose of an officer’s report is not to decide the issues but to inform the members of relevant considerations relating to an application for permission. Part of a planning officer’s expert function is to make a judgment about how much information needs to be included in his or her report. In R (Heath & Hampstead Society) v Camden London Borough Council[2007] 2 P & CR 19 , Sullivan J stated that the well-known passage in the judgment of Hoffman LJ (as he then was) in South Somerset District Council v Secretary of State for the Environment[1993] 1 PLR 80 , to the effect that a planning inspector should not be treated as writing an examination paper when he produces his decision letter, applies with even greater force to an officer’s report to a planning committee. I would add that it is, of course, necessary to read the passage or passages criticised in an officer’s report in the context of the document as a whole.”
“The principles are not complicated. Planning officers’ reports to committee are not to be read with undue rigour, but with reasonable benevolence, and bearing in mind that they are written for councillors with local knowledge: see the judgment of Baroness Hale of Richmond JSC in R (Morge) v Hampshire County Council[2011] PTSR 337 , para 36 and the judgment of Sullivan J in R v Mendip District Council, Ex p Fabre[2017] PTSR 1112 , 1120. Unless there is evidence to suggest otherwise, it may reasonably be assumed that, if the members followed the officer’s recommendation, they did so on the basis of the advice that he or she gave: see the judgment of Lewison LJ in R (Palmer) v Herefordshire Council [2017 1 WLR 411, para 7. The question for the court will always be whether, on a fair reading of the report as a whole, the officer has materially misled the members on a matter bearing upon their decision, and the error has gone uncorrected before the decision was made. Minor or inconsequential errors may be excused. It is only if the advice in the officer’s report is such as to misdirect the members in a material way—so that, but for the flawed advice it was given, the committee’s decision would or might have been different—that the court will be able to conclude that the decision itself was rendered unlawful by that advice.”
“… Such reports are not, and should not be, written for lawyers, but for councillors who are well-versed in local affairs and local factors. Planning committees approach such reports utilising that local knowledge and much common sense. They should be allowed to make their judgments freely and fairly without undue interference by courts or judges who have picked apart the planning officer’s advice on which they relied.”
“21. The correct approach to determining an application for planning permission has been considered several times at the highest level, and this court has amplified the principles involved. Section 38(6) of the 2004 Act requires the determination to be made ‘in accordance with the [development] plan unless material considerations indicate otherwise’. The development plan thus has statutory primacy, and a statutory presumption in its favour—which government policy in the NPPF does not. Under the statutory scheme, the policies of the plan operate to ensure consistency in decision-making. If the section 38(6) duty is to be performed properly, the decision-maker must identify and understand the relevant policies, and must establish whether or not the proposal accords with the plan, read as a whole. A failure to comprehend the relevant policies is liable to be fatal to the decision: … 22. If the relevant policies of the plan have been properly understood in the making of the decision, the application of those policies is a matter for the decision-maker, whose reasonable exercise of planning judgment on the relevant considerations the court will not disturb: see the speech of Lord Hoffmann in Tesco Stores Ltd v Secretary of State for the Environment[1995] 1 WLR 759 , 780. The interpretation of development plan policy, however, is ultimately a matter of law for the court. The court does not approach that task with the same linguistic rigour as it applies to the construction of a statute or contract. It must seek to discern from the language used in formulating the plan the sensible meaning of the policies in question, in their full context, and thus their true effect. The context includes the objectives to which the policies are directed, other relevant policies in the plan, and the relevant supporting text. The court will always keep in mind that the creation of development plan policy by a local planning authority is not an end in itself, but a means to the end of coherent and reasonably predictable decision-making, in the public interest: …”
“32. As the authorities show, the circumstances in which those basic principles are applied will vary widely. Reading the analysis in one case across into another can be mistaken. No two plans are the same. The policies of each are unique, crafted for the area or neighbourhood to which they relate, not to fit some wider pattern or prescription. Often there will be more than a single component of the development plan relevant to the proposal. In many cases—and this is one—there will be both an adopted local plan and a ‘made’ neighbourhood plan. In such cases the court must keep in mind that the ‘development plan’ to which s.38(6) applies is the statutory plan in its totality, its constituent parts taken together. Relevant polices may be found both in a local plan and in a neighbourhood plan. But the statutory presumption applies to the entire plan—the local plan and the neighbourhood plan together.”
“Recourse to the courts may sometimes be needed to resolve distinct issues of law, or to ensure consistency of interpretation in relation to specific policies, as in the Tesco case. In that exercise the specialist judges of the Planning Court have an important role. However, the judges are entitled to look to applicants, seeking to rely on matters of planning policy in applications to quash planning decisions (at local or appellate level), to distinguish clearly between issues of interpretation of policy, appropriate for judicial analysis, and issues of judgment in the application of that policy; and not to elide the two.”
“In my view, the question which I have to address under Ground 1 is whether it was in accordance with Policy 1 of the Neighbourhood Plan to release the Site for a general housing development.”
“72. … On the correct interpretation of Policy 1 and of the underlying spatial strategy and objectives of the Neighbourhood Plan, the release of the Site for the Development is not in accordance with the Neighbourhood Plan. On the contrary, development of the Site for general housing is properly to be seen as being in conflict with the principal, relevant policy of the Neighbourhood Plan. That conclusion is unaffected by the fact that the Development may be able both to fulfil the qualitative requirements of Policy 2 and to fulfil the requirements of Policy 7 to address its impacts on the road junctions identified in that policy. Neither of those factors affect the fundamental locational objection to the development of the Site for general housing that arises on the correct interpretation of Policy 1 of the Neighbourhood Plan. 73. It follows that I must conclude that the Defendant’s Committee was misled both by the advice that it received in the Report and the oral advice of planning officers at the meeting on29 January 2020 . The Committee was advised that the Neighbourhood Plan was not to be understood as treating the defined settlement boundary as a barrier to housing development on a site which lay outside that boundary. For the reasons I have given, that advice was a misinterpretation of Policy 1 of the Plan. Contrary to the submissions advanced on behalf of both the Defendant and the Interested Party, that advice is not vindicated by consideration of the Plan as a whole, its context, strategy and objectives. On the contrary, consideration of those matters only serves to reinforce the terms of Policy 1 itself, that there is, and is intended to be, no policy support for general housing development on land outside the defined settlement boundary. Planning officers’ advice that there was a tension between the Neighbourhood Plan and the emerging Draft Local Plan was confusing and begged the question whether the Development was properly to be seen as in accordance with the Neighbourhood Plan. For the reasons I have given, that question was never properly answered by the planning officers.”
“74. I have approached the dispute which arises under Ground 1 by applying the approach stated by Lindblom LJ at [31]-[32] in Chichester District Council. In my judgment, the Defendant’s Committee was materially misled by the failure correctly to interpret and to advise on the question whether the Development was in accordance with or in conflict with the Neighbourhood Plan. Planning officers acknowledged that the Neighbourhood Plan was up-to-date. Indeed it was, on the advice given both in the Report and orally, the only component of the statutory development plan which contained up-to-date, relevant policies going to the principle of development of the Site for general housing purposes. Yet there was no acknowledgement of the true position, that the Development did not accord with those up-to-date, relevant policies, in the planning officer’s conclusions on the principle of the Development in paragraph 3.12.1 of the Report. Indeed that critical paragraph simply did not address the spatial strategy and locational policy of the Neighbourhood Plan. The same error vitiates the paragraphs 4.1 to 4.3 of the Report. As a result of the misleading advice given both in the Report and orally, the Defendant failed to understand those policies and to establish, on a correct understanding of those policies, whether or not the Development was in accordance with the development plan. It is evident from the transcript of the Committee’s deliberations that Members were particularly concerned to understand whether or not the Development should properly be regarded as being in accordance with the relevant policies of the Neighbourhood Plan. This was a material error (see Mansell at [41]-[42]) and one which was liable to be fatal to the decision to grant planning permission (Gladman Developments Limited at [21]).”
“It must be the starting point for decision taking. The weight to be attributed to that document must however, as always, be balanced with and against all other material planning considerations.”
“Ultimately Members will need to pick their way through the evidence and apply their own judgement.”
“It delivers the suite of highway improvements considered vital by the Parish Council and as identified in the Thurston Neighbourhood Plan. Only this developer can provide these works because of their land ownership portfolio. Securing these improvements represents a significant gain. Failure to secure these will mean the problems associated with traffic south of the railway bridge will continue unabated.”
“The Policy says that growth will be focused, focused, not exclusive, focused in the Settlement Boundaries and that allows for exceptions to that curve and then we have the question of whether there is conflict and a clear recognition of the role of the District Council to plan ultimately for the amount of growth that Thurston will need to contribute to the district’s supply of housing and all of that takes me to a conclusion that I do not personally and Counsel does not see a conflict with the Neighbourhood Plan. It may be intended but in this instance I don’t see actually that there is a conflict in the way that is described in NPPF. That’s my opinion.”