Perrin v North Devon District Council: planning permission quashed on grounds of apparent bias and inadequate reasons

The High Court has quashed a grant of planning permission by North Devon District Council for an open market dwelling at Patchole, near Barnstaple, finding both apparent bias on the part of a senior councillor and a failure to provide adequate reasons for departing from officers' recommendations.

The site at Ley Lane had a protracted history. Two earlier applications by different parties had failed, and planning officers had consistently maintained that the site lay outside the principal built form of the settlement. Under Policy DM23 of the North Devon & Torridge Local Plan, a site in that position could only support affordable housing-focused development in accordance with Policy ST19. The interested parties sought permission for a single open market dwelling, and officers recommended refusal on each of three occasions the matter came before the Planning Committee.

The committee nonetheless resolved to grant permission in February 2025, its stated reasons pointing to changes in the National Planning Policy Framework introduced in December 2024 which triggered the "tilted balance" under paragraph 11(d) following the council's inability to demonstrate a five-year housing land supply. Policies ST19 and DM23 were accordingly treated as out of date and afforded limited weight.

HHJ Russen KC found those reasons inadequate. Whilst the committee was entitled to engage the tilted balance and reduce the weight given to the relevant policies, it had not explained why an open market dwelling — rather than an affordable one — should be given increased weight in serving the vitality of the village. Officers had expressly given significant weight to retaining the site for affordable housing even after treating the policies as out of date, and the committee offered no account of why that conclusion should not be followed. The requirement under paragraph 11(d)(ii) of the NPPF to have "particular regard" to policies providing affordable homes was not reflected in the reasoning at all.

The decision was also quashed on the ground of apparent bias arising from the involvement of Councillor Prowse. The court applied the test in Porter v Magill [2002], asking whether a fair-minded and informed observer would conclude there was a real possibility of bias. Several features combined to satisfy that test: Councillor Prowse was Facebook friends with one of the applicants and had been contacted by the other — a former council employee — for procedural advice before the application was submitted; he called in the application for committee determination, despite not having called in a comparable earlier application raising similar policy issues; and he made complimentary remarks about the applicant's family during the September 2023 meeting.

A significant portion of the judgement addresses the legal consequences of apparent bias by a single committee member. HHJ Russen KC declined to follow the suggestion in Berky v Newport City Council [2012] that apparent bias by one member does not necessarily vitiate a decision unless it can be shown to have materially influenced the outcome. Drawing on Bovis Homes v New Forest DC [2002] and the Supreme Court's recent endorsement of that decision in Spitalfields Historic Building Trust v Tower Hamlets LBC [2025], the court held that procedural unfairness arising from apparent bias renders a decision unlawful regardless of the voting arithmetic, with any relief then a matter for the court's discretion.

Discretion was exercised in favour of quashing. Councillor Prowse was a long-serving and influential member who contributed to the debate immediately before the vote, and there was no basis on which his participation could be treated as immaterial to the outcome.

The case is a reminder that planning committees departing from officers' recommendations on finely balanced applications must engage directly with the reasoning they are rejecting, and that the conduct of individual members throughout the decision-making process — not merely at the point of voting — is relevant to apparent bias.

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