viiwye.com Ltd is a combined practice of professionals offering a full range of Town and Country Planning Services. Some members have previously worked within Local Planning Authorities and The Planning Inspectorate.
Others have a research and academic background and specialise in the various requirements of achieving valid and operable planning permissions in the development process.
Most have post graduate qualifications and full professional memberships in their chosen sphere of operation.
viiwye.com has over 30 years experience in dealing with virtually every type of planning application in a regime which has become more bureaucratic and complex.
We offer full Planning Application and Appeal services together with harnessing meaningful representations in the new Local Development Framework process and as a last resort High Court challenges in relation to Local Planning Authorities actions.
We provide initial advice always without obligation or fee.
We are specialists in co-ordinating pre-applications, initial representations and responses to Local Planning Authorities. An Associate will act as your designated Consultant and ongoing adviser
There are a number of reasons why you should contact viiwye.com for free initial expert advice before any formal engagement with a Local Planning Authority:
Clients will be asked to provide viiwye.com with a brief description of their planning needs and desired outcomes, details of any actions already taken and copies of what they feel might be relevant correspondence.
It is vital for you to inform us of as many aspects as possible at the very first stage so that the correct advice can be quickly forthcoming.
Generally speaking the actions of Local Planning Authorities are open to public scrutiny.
Much will depend on whether applications are dealt with under delegated powers or have a full or partial Hearing before Planning and Planning Subcommittees. At such Committees there is generally a right for the Applicant to address the Committee for a short time on the merits of the planning proposal. Objectors also have a chance to speak. What is essential is that you keep a detailed log of conversations, meetings and telephone calls to Local Planning Authority Officers, and attempt to discover at the earliest opportunity who is dealing with your application and more importantly which Officer will decide it.
The Officers who have handled your application may not always be present at any appeal and documents and files have a habit of getting lost as do notes of meetings which are often left on different computer files. There is always the little used potential to subpoena an officer to attend a planning appeal and a simple procedure in the county court for Local Authority documents to be produced before a County Court Judge.
If it can be seen that the Local Planning Authority have acted in other than an even-handed way, there is the potential to make a planning appeal against an officer’s or the Council’s decision. Nevertheless, as a safeguard to other forms of mischief which do not have specific remedies e.g. appeal, there is the ability to make a complaint to the Local Government Ombudsman concerning the Local Authority’s conduct. The Ombudsman will not entertain any complaint unless all other remedies, have been exhausted.
There are far more severe actions which may be encompassed against a Local Planning Authority in the law of TORT. There is of course the doctrine of Misfeasance in Public Office. There is always the potential for Judicial Review of Local Authorities’ actions to be undertaken in the High Court.
In these proceedings, time is always of the essence – the sooner, the better – and legal advice and opinion must be taken as to the chances of success or otherwise. These remedies are valuable, but should be used sparingly and on good authority.