Appeal 6002017

The appeal is dismissed.

I note that the development has already been carried out and this appears to be consistent with the plans before me. For the avoidance of doubt, I have determined the appeal based on the submitted plans.

The main issue is whether the site is an appropriate location for office use, having regard to the development plan strategy for office development in the countryside and its accessibility.

The appeal site comprises a detached residential and storage building located within the curtilage of a dwelling at [site address] . The site lies around 0.75km from the defined settlement boundary of Elmesthorpe and is designated as countryside in the development plan. Access to the site is taken via single-track lanes.

The proposal is to use the building as an office for a software and marketing business, in which the appellant, who occupies the host dwelling, has an interest and is involved in its day-to-day activities. The office largely operates from 9am to 5pm on weekdays and is designed to accommodate up to 9 employees, with remote working encouraged. There are no visits to the site by commercial or waste companies or by clients, and there is no external storage.

Policy CS6 of the Blaby District Local Plan Core Strategy 2013 (CS) sets out the spatial strategy for employment development, directing such uses to locations that are accessible and well-related to settlements. Policy CS18 of the CS places restrictions on development in the countryside. It allows for limited small-scale employment development, subject to consideration of its impacts and the need to protect the countryside, when read alongside the spatial strategy for directing development to appropriate locations.

Access to the appeal site is via narrow rural lanes with no continuous pedestrian or cycle infrastructure linking it to the village or to local services and facilities. Elmesthorpe itself is a smaller village with a limited range of services and facilities, and the appeal site is not physically well-related to it. As such, the appeal site has a weak functional relationship with the settlement, hence, the use of the appeal building as an office is reliant predominantly on access by private car. Although there is no dispute that the use would not give rise to unacceptable highway safety impacts, the absence of realistic opportunities to access the site by means other than private car is inherent to its location. This reliance is not a temporary or transitional matter, nor is it capable of being materially improved.

The National Planning Policy Framework (the Framework) supports economic growth, including the growth of rural businesses through the reuse of existing buildings. It also recognises that sites to meet local business needs in rural areas may have to be found beyond existing settlements and in locations that are not well-served by public transport. In this case, there is no dispute that the sequential approach in paragraph 93 of the Framework does not apply.

The business has been operating from a countryside location since 2019 and the proposal supports economic and employment benefits by preventing disruption to that existing local business. However, notwithstanding this consideration, it is unclear why the business needs to be in the countryside. Moreover, there is no substantive evidence that alternative locations within settlements, which would be more consistent with the spatial strategy for employment development as set out in Policy CS6, have been explored.

With a gross internal area of around 98m2 and usable office space of approximately 61m2, the appellant considers that the proposed use comprises small-scale employment development under Policy CS18. Even if that were the case, this does not address the site’s poor relationship to the settlement or its limited accessibility to services and facilities. Accordingly, its locational impacts would still conflict with the requirements of Policy CS18 when read in conjunction with Policy CS6. In these circumstances, Policy DM2 of the Local Plan (Delivery) Development Plan Document 2019 does not apply.

The appeal seeks a permanent permission for a Class E use, which would run with the land. The proposal must therefore be assessed on the basis of the full range of uses that could reasonably operate within that use class, rather than the specific circumstances or working practices of the appellant’s current business. While it has been suggested that a condition could restrict the use of the building to the appellant, or limit the permission to a temporary period, no specific personal circumstances have been advanced to justify such an approach, and there is no evidence that the relevant spatial strategy would change within any proposed temporary period. The imposition of such conditions would therefore not be reasonable.

For the reasons given above, I conclude that the site is not an appropriate location for office use, having regard to the development plan strategy for employment development in the countryside and its accessibility. Therefore, conflict arises with Policies CS6 and CS18 of the CS.

The Council did not identify harm or conflict with the development plan in respect of several other matters, including character and appearance, living conditions, parking, highways, heritage and geological assets, landscape, ecology, and flood risk. I have had regard to these considerations and, even if I were to reach the same conclusions, the absence of harm in these respects would be a neutral factor which does not weigh in favour of the proposal.

The proposal would conflict with the development plan, when considered as a whole, and there are no material considerations that indicate that a decision should be made other than in accordance with it. I therefore conclude that the appeal should be dismissed.