Certificate of Lawfulness for the proposed stationing of a granny annex in a garden

Once again, working with our colleagues at Urban Marque , C2C Planning Consultants have gained a Certificate of Lawfulness for a Proposed Use for the stationing of a lovely lodge in the garden of a house for their client.

The proposed caravan meets the definition of a caravan set within of the The Caravan Act 1968 and as such is a movable structure which is meant to be a temporary feature. The submitted Planning Statement indicates the caravan would not be permanently affixed to the ground. As the caravan is for use ancillary to the main dwelling and within the curtilage of a dwelling house it is considered the proposed siting of the caravan would not change the use of the land and consequently would not constitute development as defined by the Town and Country Planning Act, 1990.

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Lawful Development Certificate – existing use

Following an enquiry from the Enforcement Officer at Mid Devon District Council, our client approached us with the view to removing the agricultural occupancy condition of a property he owned.

Having assessed that the property had been used in breach of the condition for a period of more than 10 years, we advised that the best avenue for him was a Lawful Development Certificate.

We submitted the application with a plethora of Statutory Declarations from our client and tenants of the property.  We created a timeline showing pictorially the evidence that was submitted across pages and pages of documents.  It assisted us in making sure that the Statutory Declarations covered as much of the 10 year period as possible as well as assisting the planning officer.

Timeline for the breach of agricultural occupancy condition
Timeline for the breach of agricultural occupancy condition

It took almost 8 weeks for the Council to indicate that they had no evidence to dispute the documents that we had submitted and therefore they were in a position to grant the Certificate.  This allows our client to continue with letting the property or to return to the letting it for holiday purposes.