Leeds Group plc v Leeds City Council

Town and village greens – Class C green – Neighbourhood within a locality – Section 22(1A) of Commons Registration Act 1965 – Defendants registering land owned by claimant as Class C green – Whether wrongly identifying locality – Whether identified neighbourhood having sufficient cohesiveness and defined boundaries – Whether requirements for registration met where land used by inhabitants of two neighbourhoods – Claim dismissedIn 2004, the defendant council, as registration authority, received an application, under section 13(b) of the Commons Registration Act 1965, to register land on the outskirts of Leeds as a Class C town or village green. The land included an area of which the claimant was the registered freeholder. The application claimed that the land had been used as of right by a significant number of inhabitants of a “neighbourhood within a locality” for lawful sports and pastimes for 20 years, so as to meet the requirement for registration as a Class C green in section 22(1A) of the 1965 Act, as amended by the Countryside and Rights of Way Act 2000. In the application, the relevant locality was given as “Yeadon” and the applicant described himself as acting on behalf of residents of areas known as “The Haws” and “Banksfield”. The application was supported by evidence questionnaires from 82 individuals. The claimant objected to the potential registration, disputing whether the existence of any adequately defined locality or neighbourhood from which the users of the land were drawn.The defendants conducted a non-statutory public inquiry into the issues raised by the application, with a senior barrister acting as inspector. He identified the locality as Yeadon, found that The Haws and Banksfield, while they could reasonably be viewed as two adjoining neighbourhoods, could also be regarded as one overall neighbourhood within that locality, and concluded that the requirements of the statute were met. He recommended that the land be registered as a green and the defendants accepted that recommendation.The claimant brought proceedings to challenge the registration under section 14 of the 1965 Act. It was accepted that the outcome of that claim would be determinative of its additional judicial review claim. The claimant contended that, inter alia: (i) Yeadon was not a “locality” within the meaning of the legislation, having ceased to be a legally recognised administrative district in 1937; (ii) the area identified by the inspector was not sufficiently cohesive as to constitute a neighbourhood and its boundaries had been arbitrarily defined; and (iii) so far as the land was used by inhabitants of two or more separate neighbourhoods or localities, the requirements of section 22(1A) were not met.Held: The claim was dismissed.(1) Although, prior to the 2000 Act amendments, town and village green rights could be created only on behalf of some recognisable unit of the country, parliament had clearly intended in a “neighbourhood” case to relax the requirements necessary to register a town or village green and to weaken the links with a common law village green. In construing the phrase “neighbourhood within a locality”, it was not necessary to import all the technical difficulties in the word “locality” that had arisen in respect of common law greens. A place such as Yeadon would not have lost its right to a town or village green because of the events of 1937, and the authorities did not compel any such conclusion. The boundaries of Yeadon were defined and it was the relevant locality.If that were incorrect, the local parish could qualify as the relevant locality and was not disqualified because of its size. One of the main purposes of the 2000 Act amendment was to allow inhabitants in a neighbourhood to qualify in a situation where the locality extensive was too big. Parliament could not have intended that both the neighbourhood and the locality had to be sufficiently small to accommodate a proper spread of qualifying users. The fact that a small number of users’ houses were not within the parish was de minimis and not fatal to the application: Oxfordshire County Council v Oxford City Council [2006] UKHL 25; [2006] 2 EGLR 95 and Ministry of Defence v Wiltshire County Council [1995] 4 All ER 931 considered.(2) It was not appropriate to attempt to define the word “neighbourhood”. It was an ordinary English word and its use in section 22(1A) was deliberately imprecise; parliament wanted to simplify the registration of Class C greens. References n the authorities to the need for “cohesiveness” were to be read with that in mind: R (on the application of Cheltenham Builders Ltd) v South Gloucestershire District Council [2003] EWHC 2803 (Admin); [2004] 1 EGLR 85 considered. Both The Haws and Banksfield were properly to be regarded as neighbourhoods. Although they had limited community facilities and no shops, streets connected within each neighbourhood and, although a variety of styles were built in, post-war semi-detached housing was preponderant within each of the areas. There was sufficient cohesiveness to justify the description of each area as a neighbourhood. Further, the boundaries of districts were often illogical and it was not necessary to look too hard for reasons for the boundaries. The inspector’s reasons for selecting the boundaries of The Haws and Banksfield had been rational even though the difference between the housing immediately outside and inside the two neighbourhoods might not be easily distinguishable. However, the inspector had erred in finding that there was one composite neighbourhood. The two areas were physically distinct and lacked cohesion to form a single neighbourhood; they were two separate neighbourhoods.(3) The existence of two or more qualifying neighbourhoods within a locality or localities was not fatal to an application to register a Class C green. The Act, as amended, required only a “significant number” of the inhabitants of “any neighbourhood within a locality” to have indulged in the activities. The wording did not limit the neighbourhood to “one neighbourhood” and there was no logical reason why there could not be two or more neighbourhoods: R (on the application of Oxfordshire & Buckinghamshire Mental Health NHS Foundation Trust) v Oxfordshire County Council [2010] EWHC 530 (Admin); [2010] PLSCS 98 applied.George Laurence QC and Jane Evans-Gordon (instructed by DLA Piper UK LLP) appeared for the claimant; Morag Ellis QC (instructed by the legal department of Leeds City Council) appeared for the defendants.Sally Dobson, barrister