The list below is a record of advice the Planning Inspectorate has provided in respect of the Planning Act 2008 process.
There is a statutory duty under section 51 of the Planning Act 2008 to record the advice that is given in relation to an application or a potential application and to make this publicly available. Advice we have provided is recorded below together with the name of the person or organisation who asked for the advice and the project it relates to. The privacy of any other personal information will be protected in accordance with our Information Charter which you should view before sending information to the Planning Inspectorate.
Note that after a project page has been created for a particular application, any advice provided that relates to it will also be published under the ‘s51 advice’ tab on the relevant project page.
Advice given between between 1 October 2009 and 14 April 2015 has been archived. View the archived advice.
General
Enquiry
What are the rules governing applicants in DCO processes in the following specific circumstances;
· Application is at pre-application stage (Scoping Report submitted) and is currently progressing towards full submission of the application.
· The Applicant decides that it no longer wishes to pursue the application itself – this may be either as a result of (i) it no longer believing in, or wishing to fund the progress of, the DCO process itself or (ii) it having received an attractive financial offer from an unrelated party to acquire its interests in the process). It is assumed that the Applicant does not hold/own the land interests to which the DCO process relates, therefore the acquiring party is just taking over the Applicant’s interests in the DCO application process
Apologies but there are a couple of parts to my query;
• Is the application personal to the legal entity that is noted as the Applicant?
• Is the Applicant able to transfer its position or rights as Applicant to another legal entity? If so;
o are there are any provisions that restrict the ability of the Applicant to transfer freely (e.g. are transfers restricted to Group companies only, is PINS consent required, and if so what is the basis for PINS agreeing to grant consent?)
o can the new Applicant step into the shoes of the original Applicant and benefit from documentation that had previously been submitted by, and on behalf of, the original Applicant (e.g. Scoping Report)
o do authorisations granted by PINS to the Original Applicant still apply.
· If the Applicant is not able to transfer its position in the DCO process, is a new application required?
Advice given
I will deal with each query in turn, however please note this email does not constitute legal advice which you or others can rely on. I would advise you to seek your own legal advice.
• During the pre-application stage of the process, the application is not personal to the legal entity that is noted as the Applicant.
• The Applicant may decide to continue with its proposed application, or not to progress it as it sees fit. It is a matter for the respective Applicant, not for the Inspectorate. However, the Inspectorate should be informed of any change of Applicant.
• The new Applicant may be able to step into the shoes of the original Applicant and benefit from documentation; such as a Scoping Report that had previously been submitted by, and on behalf of, the original Applicant. However, it depends on the stage of the process a proposed application has reached and if the proposed application is the same as the original. Documentation relating to funding etc would need to be Applicant specific.
• Authorisations granted by the Planning Inspectorate on behalf of the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government to the original Applicant, would not be transferable to a new Applicant as they are Applicant, not project specific.
• The new Applicant may be able to continue with the original application, this will depend on the circumstances.
