The 1991 Planning and Compensation Act confirmed that demolition of a building was development requiring planning permission. However the Secretary of State was given the power to exempt buildings from this requirement. This was set out in the Demolition (Town and Country Planning)(Demolition - Description of Buildings) Direction 1995. The High Court in the case of SAVE Britain's Heritage v The Secretary of State for Communties and Local Government has now declared that the main part of this Direction is unlawful. The basis of this decision is that the demolition of a building is a 'project' and therefore may require an Environmental Impact Assessment. A consequence of this decision is that it appears that planning permission is required for the demolition of all agricultural buildings.
A briefing note on this is at the right hand side of this page.
This is yet another burden on farmers and consideration is being given as to alternative procedures which will meet the requirements of the law without creating unnecessary bureacracy.
- John Bucknell - 17/04/2011
Surely the size of the building should be a factor before planning permission is needed to demolish it.
- David Wood - 14/04/2011
Old farm buildings in disuse will probably fall down from now on!
- j m castle - 14/04/2011
In respect of those agricultural buildings that were lawfully erected without planning permission, it must be a retrospective imposition to require planning permission for their demolition. If the obligation did not exist at the time of construction, the constructor was also entitled to demolish without permission because the building was outside the scope of urban planning control. If the controls are now being imposed retrospectively natural justice requires a transitional period to allow removal without permission. In view of the long term nature of farm buildings it would be reasonable to propose that this period would be 50% of the number of years since construction.