Planning Court judge rejects claim by parish council that leader of district gave binding promise on routing of ‘greenway’

South Cambridgeshire District Council’s leader did not give a binding promise at a local meeting that a ’greenway’ would skirt Grantchester, and in any event would have no power to do so, the High Court has found.

The case concerned a claim by Grantchester Parish Council that South Cambridgeshire leader Bridget Smith told a local meeting that the greenway plan would be dropped if village residents opposed it and therefore a decision to route it through the village was invalid.

Greenways have been promoted by the Greater Cambridge Partnership - of which members are South Cambridgeshire, Cambridgeshire County Council and Cambridge City Council - to promote travel by foot, bicycle or horse.

Grantchester Parish Council did not oppose the greenway as such but wanted it to take a route further away from the village.

Mrs Justice Lieven noted in her judgment that the case was unusual because Lang J had ordered cross examination of five witnesses to determine the disputed issue of fact.

These were Cllr Smith and Peter Blake, the partnership’s head of transport, who both said Cllr Smith made no such undertaking, and parish councillors Lesley Sherratt and Josh Newman and local resident Sarah Greaves, who said she had.

Lieven J said: “At the heart of this case is whether Councillor Bridget Smith…gave a binding commitment at a meeting on 17 October 2022 that the route of the HG would not go through Grantchester if the residents were opposed to it.

This formed the parish council’s first ground. Its second was whether any rational decision maker would have undertaken further investigation of the dispute as to whether a promise had been made, pursuant to Secretary of State for Education v Tameside MBC [1977] AC 1014.

Lang J had ordered oral evidence and cross examination because of the dispute of primary fact as to what Cllr Smith had said, “however, unfortunately oral evidence frequently does not, and did not in this case, much elucidate the situation”, Lieven J said.

She said she had to consider three stages: was there a clear and unambiguous commitment; was it reasonable for the parish council to rely upon it; would it be inappropriate to allow it to enforce the commitment.

Lieven J noted Mr Newman had attended the meeting and it was “striking that he said that he didn't remember thinking during the meeting that what [Cllr Smith] had said meant the village had a veto, but only that the route would not be ‘forced on us’”.

She said: “This is a good example of the problem when lawyers fixate upon words spoken by non-lawyers, and perhaps of why oral statements in a non-formal setting should very rarely give rise to legally binding commitments, particularly those affecting third parties.

“To a lawyer, certainly one practising in the field of public law, if the route was not going to be ‘forced on’ the village, then that was in effect a veto. But that was not how [Mr Newman] interpreted whatever [Cllr Smith] said at that moment.”

Cllr Smith was “absolutely clear” that she would not have given a binding commitment as this would have been improper, but might have said something along the lines of "the views of the village will be respected”.

That though would have been in the sense of taking them into consideration, not necessarily being complied with.

Lieven J said it was a basic proposition of local government that individual councillors cannot give binding commitments. Any competent officer who heard such a promise would have intervened.

The parish council suggested Mr Blake had not so intervened because he had not been concentrating at the key moment, “but that rather reinforces the suggestion that even if some words were spoken, they would not have been clear and unequivocal”, the judge said.

She said Cllr Smith’s evidence relied strongly on what she believes she would have said, rather than a memory of what she actually did say.

“However, in my view it is unlikely that she would have given anything that could amount to a binding commitment, and that if she had done so [Mr Blake] would have intervened at the meeting or immediately thereafter.”

Lieven J concluded: “I accept that on the facts of the case it is inherently unlikely that [Cllr Smith] would have given a binding commitment.

“She is a highly experienced local councillor. She is fully aware of the limitation on her power to bind other councillors or the council. To give such a binding commitment at an informal meeting, when she knew she had no power to do so, would have been a fairly extraordinary thing to do.

“[Cllr Smith] did not strike me as being at all likely to have made an error of such magnitude. It would have been even more surprising given that the other executive members of the [partnership] came from different councils, so [she] would have had even less justification to feel she could bind their decision making.”

On the second ground, Lieven J said: “It is quite hard to understand how this Ground works analytically.”

The parish council argued the partnership should have undertaken some further investigation what Cllr Smith said.

Lieven J said even if Cllr Smith had given a commitment about the greenway, “she had no power to bind [the partnership]. In my view such an approach was legally correct. Therefore there could not possibly be any further duty of inquiry.”

Dismissing Grantchester’s claim, she added it was “very hard to see what further inquiry there could have been a duty to undertake”.

Mark Smulian