Leeds wins delegated powers challenge

A judge has ruled in favour of Leeds City Council following a High Court challenge that thousands of the council’s planning decisions made by officers were invalid because the local authority had not formally approved the necessary delegated powers for a period of more than three years.

Mr Justice Wyn Williams argued it was “unthinkable” that decisions taken on the council’s behalf by officers between 2004 and early 2008 had no legal effect.

The judge said the council had adopted a “perfectly sensible means” of amending its constitution “as and when necessary” since its adoption in 2001.

However, the judge acknowledged that the city council had taken an unacceptably long time to put together its case that its officer delegation arrangements were legally valid.

The case arose after a planning dispute over proposals for 12 new flats in Morley which a local businessman, Mark Snee, 52, and his company, Technoprint, opposed.

Mr Snee and Technoprint launched a court challenge when the scheme was approved by the council’s chief planning officer and asked for details of the delegated powers under which the decision was made.

Councillor Andrew Carter, leader of Leeds City Council and executive member responsible for planning, said: “We welcome the court’s decision and findings and we are pleased the court confirmed that the council adopted and applied a perfectly sensible means of amending its constitution as and when necessary since it was first adopted in 2001.

“As the judge pointed out, in the period since 2001 no one could have been misled into thinking that the council was doing other than delegating a huge range of decisions to its officers. Any person reading the constitution from time to time would properly be informed as to the scheme of delegation in being as it evolved.”

 

Roger Milne

10 December 2009