A recent decision serves as a useful reminder on the six tests a planning condition is required to meet.
A planning permission granted by Hertsmere Council was subject to a condition requiring proposed privacy screening to be consulted on and agreed by local residents, in order for the condition to be discharged.
Following a complaint by the local residents at this consultation not having been carried out, a report issued by the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman makes clear the Council accepts this condition could not be enforced and therefore fails to meet the requirements of the NPPF.
In order to be enforceable, the NPPF requires that a planning condition must be kept to a minimum and must satisfy the following six tests:
- Necessary;
- Relevant to planning;
- Relevant to the development to be permitted;
- Enforceable;
- Precise; and
- Reasonable in all other respects.
A condition which requires consultation of members of the public is unlikely to satisfy the fourth test, since it is only a local planning authority which can discharge a condition.
Misconception of what constitutes an appropriate planning condition in planning law
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