Cases - South Oxfordshire District Council v Secretary of State for the Environment and Keene
Record details
- Name
- South Oxfordshire District Council v Secretary of State for the Environment and Keene
- Date
- (1986)
- Citation
- 52 P&CR 1
- Legislation
- Keywords
- Planning control
- Summary
-
A farmer contended that the construction of a 500,000 gallon reservoir for irrigation was an engineering operation for the purposes of agriculture and so permitted by the GDO 1977. The local planning authority contended that it was a building operation, in which case it breached the size limits in the GDO (the embankment was too big). The Secretary of State upheld the farmer's claim and the local authority appealed.
One of the issues in this case was whether an earthen embankment creating a reservoir was within the definition 'gate, fence, wall or other means of enclosure'. Mr Justice McCullough stated that it would plainly not be a gate, fence or wall and in considering whether it was 'other means of enclosure', the Secretary of State should construe that phrase ejusdem generis with gate, fence or wall.
The High Court stated that the Secretary of State seemed to have jumped to the conclusion that because something could more accurately be called an engineering operation than a building operation, then no building could have resulted. This was wrong. He should have considered whether the embankment was a building (a structure or erection) and so the case was remitted to him.