Making Your Lawful Development Certificate Appeal (Guide)

The written procedure

Appeals which are decided by the written procedure are governed by The Town and Country Planning (Enforcement) (Written Representations Procedure) (Wales) Regulations 2003. The timetable for the written procedure is designed to make the appeal proceed quickly and fairly. Everyone involved in the appeal should keep to the timetable. If you decide on the written procedure, everything you want to say about your appeal must be in writing. Although the Inspector will visit the site and may meet you (see below), you will not be able to discuss why your appeal should be allowed.

Grounds of appeal

The grounds of appeal, set out on the appeal form, make up your case. If you do not provide them, or we think your grounds are inadequate, we may ask you for more details.

Questionnaire

The regulations say that the LPA must fill in a questionnaire and send it to you and us with documents to support their decision.

6-week statement

If you, or the LPA, want to add any more comments, you must send two copies of this statement so as to be received within six weeks of the ‘starting date’. We will send a copy of your statement to the LPA and send you a copy of any statement they send us. We will also send you any comments from interested persons.

We will not accept late statements other than in extraordinary circumstances. Instead we will return them to you.

9-week comments

Within nine weeks of the starting date, we must receive from you and the LPA any comments on each other’s statement and on the comments made by any interested persons.

We will not accept late comments other than in extraordinary circumstances. Instead we will return them to you.

Do not comment just for the sake of it. Only send us further comments if you have something new to say.

Late comments

We expect everyone involved to keep to the timetable. If the Inspector asks for more information from you or the LPA, we will send a copy of that information to you or the LPA. We will allow time for comment.

The site visit

The appeal papers are sent to the Inspector. He or she will study the appeal papers, reason(s) for refusal and comments, and will usually visit the site. If a site visit is not going to be made we will let you know and give you the opportunity to make any comment.

If you said on your appeal form that the Inspector can view the site from public land, and the LPA agree, we will arrange an unaccompanied site visit where the Inspector will view the site alone.

When we arrange an accompanied site visit both you and the LPA have to be there or have someone to represent you. If you or the LPA do not turn up, the Inspector will make the inspection alone. If this is not possible, we will rearrange the visit for a time when all sides can be there.

If the Inspector needs to go on to private land to make the inspection, you must arrange this. Anyone who asks will be told the date and time of the visit.

When the Inspector makes an accompanied site visit, he or she will introduce themselves and find out the names of everyone there. The Inspector will make sure everyone agrees that they are dealing with the same site the LPA considered in your application. If people disagree, the Inspector may ask them to resolve the disagreement between themselves. The Inspector won’t take part in these discussions. He or she cannot accept any changes at the site visit.

The Inspector will ask people to point out any physical features they think are important on, or near the site. He or she may also want to confirm particular features people talked about in their written comments. But you cannot discuss why you think your appeal should be allowed. Everything like this must be in writing.

Sometimes, the owners of the land next to the appeal site ask the Inspector to look at the site from their property. If the Inspector thinks this is necessary he or she will tell you and the LPA at the site inspection. If the Inspector goes onto someone else’s land as part of the site visit you and the LPA must go too.

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