Cases - Pioneer Aggregates (UK) Ltd v Secretary of State for the Environment and Peak Park Joint Planning Board
Record details
- Name
- Pioneer Aggregates (UK) Ltd v Secretary of State for the Environment and Peak Park Joint Planning Board
- Date
- [1985]
- Citation
- AC 132
- Legislation
- Keywords
- Planning control - Town and Country Planning Act 1990
- Summary
-
In 1950 planning permission was granted for the mining and working of limestone. Quarrying ceased by 1967. In 1978 Pioneer Aggregates became interested in the site and asked the Board if planning permission was needed for quarrying. The Board replied to the effect that the planning permission had been abandoned. Pioneer challenged this decision.
The House of Lords held that, as planning permission enures for the benefit of the land, it cannot be abandoned. The House distinguished abandonment and extinguishment of existing use rights from abandonment of planning permission. Such use rights are not in the nature of a permission, and abandonment means that they cease to be existing rights.
[Special provisions now apply to minerals permissions. Under Schedule 9 of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990 a prohibition order coupled with restoration conditions may be served in respect of operations which have permanently ceased (2 years cessation with resumption unlikely). A suspension order may be served to protect the environment where operations have been temporarily suspended. There are special rules concerning discontinuance orders.]
(The House accepted that where 2 inconsistent planning permissions are granted, the implementation of one may render it physically impossible to carry out the other, as in Pilkington v Secretary of State.)