Council drops asylum seeker airfield judicial review after concluding it is academic
Braintree District Council has decided to drop its appeal of a judicial review decision relating to Home Office plans to accommodate asylum seekers on Wethersfield Airfield, after concluding that a Special Development Order (SDO) rendered its legal challenge academic.
The decision brings an end to a long-running legal dispute that saw the council pursue an injunction and a judicial review challenge over the scheme, and marks the second council to end its legal challenge against the Home Office over similar plans this week.
Its judicial review brought jointly with West Lindsey District Council, opposed the use of emergency permitted development rights that allowed the Home Office to kick-start plans to move asylum seekers on to Wethersfield Airfield and RAF Scampton, the airfield in West Lindsey's region.
In March this year, the Home Office replaced the permitted development permission with an SDO, a type of secondary legislation allowing the Home Secretary to grant planning permission for the site.
The SDO allows the site to be used for asylum accommodation for a further three years with up to six months of decommissioning.
With the SDO in place, Braintree concluded that it is "no longer expedient" to pursue the appeal, as the challenge against the use of emergency permitted development rights is now academic.
The news comes as West Lindsey announced it had dropped its own legal challenge after reaching an agreement with the Home Office that would see just 10% of RAF Scampton used to house asylum seekers.
Cllr Graham Butland, the leader of Braintree District Council, said: "We've stated since day one that we do not agree with the approach the government has taken by using the site for large scale asylum accommodation, and bypassing us as the local planning authority to grant itself permission, which meant the opportunity for communities' voices to be heard was lost.
"We've spent the last few months carefully considering our legal challenge and with the Special Development Order now in place, we feel at this time it is within the best interest to safeguard our resources and money.
"The cost of the legal challenges has had to be met by taxpayers across the whole of the Braintree District, which has been an important consideration as part of this decision."
The council noted that it would preserve funding and resources in order to consider any potential future enforcement action that may arise under the SDO.
Adam Carey
