CAPTAIN LEE JONES v SHROPSHIRE COUNCIL (2025) EWHC 365 (Admin) is an application for Judicial Review of the Council’s Decision to issue and serve on the Claimant a CIL Stop Notice under Regulation 90 of the Community Infrastructure Regulations 2010. Read more »
RATES RETENTION
February 24th, 2025 by James Goudie KC in Council Tax and RatesThe Non-Domestic Rates ( Designated Areas ) Regulations 2025, S.I. 2025/180, form part of the rates retention system. They allow local authorities to retain 100% rather than 50% of growth in business rates income in specified areas. They designate 6 areas, primarily in the East Midlands and the North East.
GUIDANCE
February 24th, 2025 by James Goudie KC in Decision making and ContractsA Welsh Government publication provides Guidance on Frameworks under the PROCUREMENT ACT 2023, both framework agreements and the new “ open frameworks “, and on call-off contracts.
PLANNING APPLICATION
February 21st, 2025 by James Goudie KC in Planning and EnvironmentalSection 70C of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990 bears the heading “power to decline to determine retrospective application”. Its purpose, or one of its purposes, is to prevent repeat planning applications being used to delay or frustrate ENFORCEMENT ACTION by taking many “bites of the cherry”. In R (MORAN) v MEDWAY COUNCIL (2025) EWHC 350 (Admin) the Council invoked Section 70C in the decision challenged declining to determine a planning application submitted by the Claimant. A LPA can do that under Section 70C(1) Read more »
MERGER
February 21st, 2025 by James Goudie KC in Judicial Control, Liability and LitigationThe appeal in NASIR v ZAVARCO plc (2025) UKSC 5 concerned the scope of the longstanding English law doctrine of merger. In short, the question is whether the doctrine, by which a cause of action merges with a judgment in the action, applies to a declaratory judgment. The Supreme Court held that it does not.
The doctrine of merger was developed as a means to promote finality in litigation and to prevent duplicative and vexatious litigation. Unlike the standard defence of res judicata in the form of cause of action estoppel, which prevents the contradiction of an earlier judgment as to the existence or non-existence of a cause of action, merger was designed to make a litigant seek his or her remedies in one action by extinguishing a cause of action when judgment has been given on it. Read more »
PUBLIC PROCUREMENT
February 18th, 2025 by James Goudie KC in Decision making and ContractsThe Procurement Act 2023 (Consequential and other Amendments) Regulations 2025, S.I. 2025/163, make substantive amendments to the Procurement Act 2023 (PA 2023) and the Procurement Regulations 2024 (PR 2024), as well as consequential amendments arising from the coming into force of the PA 2023. They: update certain specified threshold amounts; reflect additions and amendments to the UK’s international obligations in respect of procurement; make consequential amendments to primary legislation rendered necessary by the coming into force of the PA 2023; make amendments to the PR 2024 that address a small number of matters for which provision was not made in those Regulations; contain consequential amendments to secondary legislation and assimilated law which are rendered necessary by the coming into force of the PA 2023; make repeals and revocations rendered necessary by the coming into force of the PA 2023; and contain transitional provisions.
A collection of updated Cabinet Office Procurement Policy Notes include: PPN 001: Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises (SME) and Voluntary, Community and Social Enterprises (VCSE) procurement spend targets; PPN 002: Taking account of social value in the award of contracts; PPN 003: the Public Services (Social Value) Act 2012; PPN 004: Open Book Contract Management; PPN 005: Reserving below threshold procurements; PPN 006: Taking account of Carbon Reduction Plans in the procurement of major government contracts; PPN 007: Contracts with Russia and Belarus; PPN 008: Armed Forces Covenant; PPN 009: Tackling modern slavery in government supply chains; PPN 010: Procuring steel in government contracts; PPN 011: The Commercial Playbooks; PPN 012: Security Classifications Policy; PPN 013: Using standard contracts; PPN 015: How to take account of a supplier’s approach to payment in the procurement of major contract; PPN 016: Carbon Reduction Contract Schedule; PPN 017: Improving transparency of AI use in procurement; and PPN 018: How to take account of a supplier’s approach to payment in the procurement of major contracts.
CHARGEABLE DWELLINGS
February 18th, 2025 by James Goudie KC in Council Tax and RatesIn the common situation of a house in MULTIPLE OCCUPATION where each of the bedrooms is ( 1 ) lockable and ( 2 ) EXCLUSIVELY OCCUPIED by a separate tenant, who shares the common parts, STANUSZEK v BUNYAN ( Listing Officer ) ( No 2 ) ( 2025 ) EWHC 255 ( Admin ) holds that each falls to be assessed for council tax purposes under the Local Government Finance Act 1992 as a SEPARATE DWELLING/hereditament. It is irrelevant that the tenants share the common areas of the house, which include a kitchen and a living room. A single hereditament cannot contain discrete parts occupied by different persons. “ Occupation “ of a space in rating law as defined by the Court of Appeal in JS LAING v KINGSWOOD ASSESSMENT COMMITTEE requires exclusive possession of that space. Applying the geographical WOOLWAY v MAZARS Supreme Court test on the identification of an hereditament each bedroom in the HMO was “ capable “ of being a separate and discrete hereditament, AND it was separately occupied.
CLARIFICATIONS DURING A TENDER PROCESS
February 18th, 2025 by James Goudie KC in Decision making and ContractsIn WORKING ON WELLBEING LTD v SoS (2025) EWCA Civ 127 Coulson LJ (with whom Frazer and Zacaroli LJJ agree) summarises the relevant principles as follows:-
“82. I consider that the authorities demonstrate that there are three stages to consider when addressing whether or not, in the particular circumstances of any given case, a contracting authority has the discretion to seek clarification, when that discretion becomes a duty, and what the permissible limits are to any response to a request for clarification.
Stage One
- The first stage arises only where the error or ambiguity is obvious to the contracting authority and is material to the outcome of the competition. That will be rare, which explains why any duty to seek clarification will only arise in exceptional cases … the only question is whether the error or ambiguity was obvious to the contracting authority: it is not a question of the error or ambiguity being “objectively verifiable”.
- All of the cases stress that the error of ambiguity must be “serious” and “manifest”… The error or ambiguity must also be “material” or “significant”: it must be relevant to the “outcome” of the tender process… If the error or ambiguity is immaterial or irrelevant to the final outcome of the competition, no further action is necessary.