Railways, Car Parks and ACVs

Those of you who’ve come along to one of our previous ACV seminars or workshops will know that there are still quite a few unresolved issues surrounding the listing of ACVs.  I’ve just come from a Review Hearing in relation to the listing of the car park of a heritage railway station (the Watercress Line, for those who know it).  The outcome was that the car park was removed from the list of ACVs and entered in the authority’s list of unsuccessful nominations, where it will stay for the next five years.

All well and good, but the question you’re asking is probably “why?” or “how?”.  It transpired that the nominating body had incorrectly identified too much land as part of the nomination – they had drawn their lines over too large an area.  As a result the nomination was defective ‘ab initio‘.  The more astute

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ACV, appeal, Asset of Community Value, judicial review, listing, Localism Act 2011

27/03/2014

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Judicial Review and ACVs

As no doubt you are all aware, from 1st July 2013 the Civil Procedure (Amendment No.4) Rules 2013 came into force amending rules 52.15, 54.5 and 54.12 regarding judicial review.  We have received a really interesting query through our blog regarding these changes and how they affect ACV listing.  What is the time limit now concerning applications for judicial review of a local authority’s decision to list?

First a brief recap regarding the changes.  Whereas previously the claim form for all applications for judicial review had to be filed ‘promptly’ and ‘in any event not later than 3 months after the grounds to make the claim first came’ [CPR Part 54.5(1)], now in all applications for judicial review which relate ‘to a decision made by the Secretary of State or local planning authority under the planning acts’ the claim form ‘must be filed not later than six weeks after the grounds to make the claim first arose’ [CPR Part 54.5(5) – my emphasis].

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ACV, appeal, Asset of Community Value, Civil Procedure Rules, CPR, JR, judicial review, Local community, pre-action protocol

13/11/2013

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As Easy as A C V – back to basics…

So after a couple of exciting posts let’s get back to basics.  What exactly is this all about?

The Community Right to Bid is one of the initiatives brought in by the Localism Act 2011.  The key legislation you will need to print and store close by is Chapter 3 of Part 5 of the Localism Act 2011, which came into force on 21 September 2012, and The Assets of Community Value (England) Regulations 2012.  The Department for Communities and Local Government (DCLG) issued the Community right to bid: non-statutory advice note to local authorities on 4 October 2012 which is also one for the ‘ACV file’ as is a note of the microsite provided by DCLG ‘Community Rights’ which provides an overview of the Scheme.  This will provide you with a good basic tool kit.

In short, the Right Honourable Don Foster MP makes it clear in his Ministerial Foreword to the DCLG advice note that the Scheme aims to encourage more community-focused locally-led action by providing a tool to help communities who are looking to take over and run local assets.  This is done by giving communities the opportunity to identify such assets and nominate them for listing.  When they subsequently come up for sale, they will have more time to raise funds and bid for them.  I pause at this juncture to emphasise that this is only a right to bid; it may not be successful.  Section 2 of the note gives a good outline of how the Scheme works and this is a really good place to start if you really want a basic overview and introduction to the concept.

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ACV, Asset of Community Value, DCLG, Department for Communities and Local Government, Local community, Local government, Localism Act 2011, Planning, Planning permission

10/11/2013

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THE RACE TO LIST OR SELL

We’ve been doing some training sessions on ACVs recently and an interesting question came up in York. What happens if an application is received to list a building or land which has already been marketed for sale?

We anticipate that this will be a very common scenario because it will often be the fact that it has been put up for sale that galvanises the community organisation to apply to list it as an ACV in order to benefit from the moratorium period to see if they can submit a bid to buy it.  So what’s the answer?

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ACV, intention to sell, listing, sale of ACV

07/11/2013

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AND THE FIRST APPEAL GOES TO THE COMMUNITARIAN CORNER….

Exciting times in the world of ACVs as the very first formal appeal was determined on the 17th October 2013. The picture is of the Chesham Arms in Homerton. This is the subject of all the excitement and it truly is exciting as this appeal has ramped up the debate between the communitarians and the libertarians concerning private ownership rights vs the wishes of the community.

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ACV, appeal, compensation

29/10/2013

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The A (CV) Team

Hello all and welcome to our Community Asset Law blog.  You may have already been dealing with Community Assets or you may have absolutely no idea what we’re talking about – either way, we’re here to help you to navigate your way through the law.

A bit about us…

We are all barristers at 12 College Place in the Planning and Land Law teams.  You can find links to our individual profiles on the ‘Meet the Team’ page.  Our team is made up of barristers of all levels of seniority from William Webster,  who most recently acted in the high profile listing of Manchester United football ground Old Trafford, through to our Junior barrister Leanne Buckley-Thomson. Those of you who have found your way to the blog having recently attended one of our recent 2013 Roadshows will have already had the benefit of Felicity Thomas‘ Assets of Community Value (ACV) talk.  Others of you may have found us through Scott Stemp‘s well-known Planning law blog.  Needless to say we have a full team of people  here at 12 College Place working on the blog to assist you with your ACV queries.

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27/10/2013

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