CHALK FROM CHEESE
SIR,—I hold no particular brief for the Minister of Housing, and Local Government, and certainly it seems from the facts presented by Mr. Levin that his action regarding the proposal for limestone quarry- ing at Stansted has been curious to say the least. However, whets the Minister wrote that 'having given my decision 1 have no further power to re-open the matter' he was speaking little but the truth.
Section 16 of the Town and Country Planning '.ct, 1947, regarding 'Appeals to the Minister' is relevant here. Paragraph 2 of this section states tha:: 'Where an appeal is brought under this section from a decision of the local planning authority the Minister may allow or dismiss the appeal . and deal with the application as if it had been made to him in the first instance: and the provisions of the last foregoing section shall apply ...' Paragraph 3 of Section 15 bluntly states : 'The decision of the' Minister on any application referred to him under this section shall be final.' And that, I think, is almost that. The powers given to the Minister under
Section 100 of the same Act, referred to by Mr. Levin, relate to the revocation of planning decisions.
a different matter from the reconsideration or reopening of an already 1:ktermined planning application. In the event of revocation the planning authority is liable to compensate the holder of the permission, and it would not, I think, be possible for the Minister to revoke a decision unless new circum- stances arose making it expedient to do so.
However, cases such as this do raise the question whether the Minister's Inspectors, those 'civil ser- vants with limited responsibility,' should have more responsibility delegated to them. A Town Planning Inquiry is a quasi-judicial procedure, and I per- sonally think, despite the formidable arguments to the contrary, a very good case could be made for the man hearing the evidence coming to the decision.
It would, of course, be necessary to extend the scope of local inquiries. The reason why the Minister, after considering the transcript of evidence, differed froni his Inspector in this particular instance was probably due to national considerations of the need for limestone quarrying—a question of policy that was possibly not explored at the local inquiry.— Yours faithfully,.
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