I am case officer for an application for Prior Notification of Proposed demolition of a public house. The building dates from the 19th Century and isn't listed or in a conservation area and requries prior notification following the court of appeal judgement relating to demolition in 2011. The building is considered to be a locally significant non designated heritage asset. The prior notification application was recieved by the council on 12/07/12 notifing the council that the developer intends to demolish the building after the 28 day notification period. Subsequent to the prior notifcation being received, a provisional article 4 direction has been served on the building following political pressure thus removing permitted development rights on the building with the result that demolition of the building now requires planning permission. Myself and other colleagues are stumped as to how to resolve the current prior notificaton application. Clearly, if an article 4 had been in place when the prior notication was submitted it would not have been validated as the prior notification would not have been the correct procedure. We have a number of options as outlined below and I would welcome peoples comments/ advice on the best solution. 1. Respond by stating that prior approval is not required (Env Health have no objection) but state on decision notice that pp now requried for demoliton. 2. Respond by stating that prior approval is required as one could argue that the Council is not happy with means of demolition / site restoration as the council would wish to resist demolition. 3. Do not formally issue a notice and instead contact the applicant and inform that prior notification is now not the appropriate process following the serving of the article 4 and that they need to apply for planning permission. WIth options 1 and 3 I am concerned that by accepting the notice (option1 ) / not formally responding (option 3) we are allowing the demolition. It would be useful if there was some case law which demonstrated that the article 4 in place overides the prior notification procedure i.e by accepting the notice this does not allow demolition if there is an article 4 in place. With option 2 it is not strictly correct to respond by stating the prior approval is required as what is really required is planning permission. In summary, the two options available to us as an LPA either to state prior approval not required (accepting the notice) or to state prior approval required are not appropriate options. We really need to be able to tell them that planning permission is required.
