Quote: bren2k "In my experience, when it comes to planning disputes, it's not necessarily about 'offences' in the traditional, legal sense; we're talking here about the fine details of planning law, and potentially, misconduct in public office type stuff. Hardly the stuff of exciting legal dramas, but serious enough to get the attention of respondents - because defending such action costs time, money and reputation.
I'm only speculating here - I have no inside knowledge of this case - but I have been involved in planning disputes on a number of occasions; I watched a specialist planning lawyer tear the representatives of a provincial Council to pieces recently, such that they withdrew part way through and accepted that they had an urgent need to redraft all of their planning guidance and documentation as an urgent matter.
Who knows - I could be totally wrong and this could be MC having a tantrum; but I doubt it very much.'"
Such a shame it has come to this, I was really hoping the Belle Vue solution was the one. That said if the club wanted to relocate to Bedfordshire then they'd have one supporter here!
As I put on one of the other recent threads planning law is one of the most complicated laws out there and you are correct, sometimes councils get it wrong and decisions do get overturned. But those very same technicalities that can do that can also backfire and confirm a planning departments decision. I have seen on more than one occasion a lawyer claiming a cast iron case or a sure-fire win leave beaten with their tail between their legs as the endless technicalities backed the council up. It will be a potentially costly exercise, whatever the trust have been told it will cost, add at least 50% and keep it as a slush fund, chances are you'll need it as it drags on. The main winners here will be the legal teams, they will be the one that trouser the money.
Best case scenario that I can see is the Newcold build gets put back into the unilateral undertaking and counts towards the trigger point, although that won't solve a great deal in the long run. It will mean the development has been started so the permission deadline becomes irrelevent, but that also then removes any claim to just land banking by the developer moving forward which is something the government are wanting to crack down on. As for claims of deliberate misconduct then that is very hard to prove. what would be more likely is they would be deemed to have mis-interpreted the rules and regulations, which leads to a much lesser penalty and less damage to a reputation.
Without the full facts it's impossible to know how it would plan out but more challenges fail than are successful so if anybody has been told a win is a shoe-in, it's highly likely to be wrong, there is no such thing in this area. Just an awful lot of legal arguing over fine detail to come and then fingers crossed they did actuaally get it wrong. I would always say avoid going to court if at all possible, it is a big risk. But I have to agree with those that say it likely still won't lead to a stadium being built by Yorkcourt, if they ever had any intention of doing that it would be there by now. It might stop them making a bit of extra money money out of the site at a guess and it would certainly cause the odious toad that is Peter Box to get his knickers in a twist which would be nice as i can't stand the man but that is about it. I wish everybody involved good luck but please consider all options wisely as it really is a legal minefield.
