15/04/11….Campaigners seek High Court ruling on advertising on roundabouts

CPRE, the Campaign to Protect Rural England, has asked the High Court to rule on South Oxfordshire District Council?s claim that it can ignore its own policies to protect the countryside.

The Oxfordshire Branch of the Campaign to Protect Rural England (CPRE) says that it is challenging South Oxfordshire District Council?s (SODC) claim that it is entitled to: “… flout its own planning policies when it is in its own interest to do so.”

?SODC acknowledged they were breaching their own policies, but they went ahead anyway,? said Michael Tyce, Chairman of CPRE Thame District. ?If the Council thinks it is OK for them to flout the policies to protect our rural environment, then it leaves those who care for the countryside no option but to take them to the courts.?

BACKGROUND

The campaign group says that: “In 2006 South Oxfordshire District Council, without any consultation, erected commercial advertising signs on its roundabouts in the countryside, in flagrant contradiction of its own policies prohibiting advertising in our rural area in general, and particularly to protect the Green Belt, AONB and Conservation Areas. They deliberately evaded seeking the permissions they knew all along were required.

“Even after the Council had admitted that it should have applied for advertising consent, it took them five years to do so, during all of which time they left the advertisements unlawfully in place. Only late last year did the Council decide to comply with the planning controls which it is entrusted to enforce.

“Even though the advertising was accepted to be in flagrant contravention of the Council?s own policies to keep South Oxfordshire ?advertising free?, the Councillors then went ahead and granted themselves permission.

“Apart from being contrary to its polices, this was also in clear defiance of ?localism?, as thirteen of the fourteen affected parishes eventually consulted by the Council had joined CPRE in opposition to the scheme.”

Michael Tyce continued: ?Threatened by CPRE with legal action, the Council?s defence was that it considered itself under no obligation to conform to its own policies, explicit though they are, when it suited it.

“Not only are the signs damaging to the rural setting of South Oxfordshire, which had up until then been an ?advertising-free? area, and a deliberate distraction to motorists and therefore a traffic hazard, but it is surely unacceptable that policies we rely on our Councillors to uphold should simply be flouted at will in this way when it suits them.?

CPRE has now asked the High Court for a Judicial Review of the Councillor?s actions.

Michael Tyce concluded: ?We are confident that the Court will quash the planning consents. Even if, however, the Court finds that there is some technical loophole which allows Councillors to contravene their own Council?s policies, it is surely a betrayal of voters that they should have done so. If they can cast aside a core policy for the protection of the countryside in such a cavalier manner, which policies can they be relied on to uphold?

“We should all stop to think, as we cast our votes in South Oxfordshire next month, how much our present Councillors can be trusted to uphold their own policies to protect our environment and amenity.?