Can the council take action against a new beer garden overlooking our properties?

Our neighbour’s social club converted a lawn into a beer garden with six benches at the front of the club and raised the level so that the beer garden overlooks our property and neighboring properties.

We challenged the municipality because it did not have a building permit. The council has declared it does not need planning permission after they removed a brick wall from the beer garden and said people should not be in the beer garden after 10pm.

We disagreed as noise, environmental concerns etc were not taken into account. We have challenged the council but they will not provide any information as to why planning permission was not required.

This will affect at least four adjacent properties. Is there any way we can get compensation and enforce a retrospective building permit as none of the neighboring properties have been consulted?

Myra Butterworth, MailOnline real estate expert, replies: The new construction of the garden sounds like a nuisance to the neighbors and it must be very frustrating that you are not getting any answers from the municipality.

While the council may have good reasons for not requiring a building permit, it would be helpful if they could provide an explanation behind their decision so that you can understand the situation.

We speak with a planning expert about how best to convince a municipality to provide the desired information and even ultimately change course so that it takes further action.

Martin Gaine, a chartered urban planner, explains: Often it’s the little things that have the biggest impact on the neighbour’s quality of life.

It might not seem like a big deal for a social club to put six benches on some grass at the front of the building, but using those benches could result in punters overlooking the neighbors’ gardens and both noise and cause any nuisance.

It seems to me that this new beer garden may well need planning permission – for the raised ground levels, the placement of benches and the change of use of the front land to a beer garden.

However, the municipality may have good reasons to consider that no planning permission is required in this case.

Perhaps it has decided that the increase in land level is so small that it does not count as an act of development.

The benches may be regarded as temporary structures and it may have been decided that the establishment of a beer garden on land adjacent to the social club was not a change of use (in industry jargon, that the beer garden is a ‘subordinate’ to the club’s use).

The council also has the power to decide that planning permission is required, but to rule that no further action is necessary.

The planners have wide discretion to decide that a schedule violation is minor and that it is not in the public interest to proceed with it.

Whether a breach is small is clearly a matter of opinion and it is sometimes only through the persistent efforts of local people that action is taken.

Therefore, you need to get to the bottom of the matter.

Ask for a clear written explanation from the planning team as to why they decided no planning permission is needed. i

If that explanation doesn’t come, or isn’t convincing, speak to your local ward councilors – they are your representatives within the council apparatus.

If in doubt, seek advice from a qualified planning consultant, who can review the council’s explanation and let you know if it stands up to scrutiny.

Getting a council to change course can be a slow process, but you can keep the pressure on through the planners, councilors and the council’s own grievance process.

If you do find that the council is stubbornly and unfairly refusing to act, you should consider formal legal action, which will require the help of a good lawyer.

Martin Gaine is a chartered urban planner and author of ‘How to Get Planning Permission – An Insider’s Secrets