E-cases legal rules laid down
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IN AN attempt to prevent future public inquiries on environmental cases becoming a free-for-all general meeting for residents, the Transport Tribunal has set out the legal ground rules.
To lessen confusion for both operators and Licensing Authorities, the Tribunal has set out the groundrules in the written judgment of the first environmental case which reached it for appeal. It allowed an appeal by UK Corrugated, of Pudsey, West Yorkshire (CM, February 9).
In the judgment the Tribunal said that residents' associations cannot make representations at public inquiries. The law says that only a person "who is the owner or occupier of land in the vicinity" can make objections_ "A residents' association does not own or occupy land and could not therefore make representations," it said.
At the same time, local residents can only make representations at a public inquiry if they follow a strict code beforehand.
Each objection or representation must be sent to the LA within 21 days of a local newspaper advertisement being placed by the operator, and then a copy of the objection must be sent to the operator.
At the public inquiry, the LA can only take account of representations made in this manner except if he decides that there are "exceptional circumstances". It is still not clear what is an exceptional circumstance.
The LA also has the power to ignore representations which he considers "vexatious, frivolous or irrelevant" the written judgment adds.
Operators can also be cross examined by the local residents who have made representations and this was another reason why there should be strict adherence to the law.
The operator should be fully aware of who was to question him and therefore the representations had to come through the proper channels.
Residents also have the right to appear personally or be legally represented, the judgment added.