Havering Council grant planning permission for redevelopment of St George's Hospital

The applicant, NHS Property Services, submitted two separate outline planning applications. The first application is for the redevelopment of a new healthcare facility together with parking, access and infrastructure.

The second proposal is for a residential-led redevelopment.  This will see the delivery of open spaces, a park and 279 new homes, 15% of which will be allocated to affordable homes. Existing buildings will be converted to provide 75 of these homes and a new build development will be constructed to provide 204 new units.

NHS Property Services previously submitted an application for the same site in November 2015 but the council resolved to refuse planning permission. Reasons for refusal included the redevelopment having a "greater impact on the openness of the green belt" and "harmful to the visual amenities of the green belt". The internal layout of four units also failed to "achieve the minimum Nationally Described Space Standard".

Planning officers worked with the applicant to address their concerns and made amendments to the proposal. The revised application increased the amount of open space; reduced the development area, building footprint and building height; and revised the floorplans to meet the minimum requirements.

The committee concluded that the revised proposal would have no greater impact on the openness of the green belt than the existing buildings and that "subject to strict controls relating to the extent of demolition, retention of specified buildings, the development envelope and height and other design requirements that the proposals meet the necessary tests and that they demonstrate a meaningful reduction in terms of impact compared to the previous refused residential scheme".

"The proposal is considered to be acceptable in respect of all other material issues, including parking and highway issues, impact on amenity and environmental effects," the committee said.

Planning expert Susanne Andreasen of Pinsent Masons, the law firm behind Out-Law.com, said: "The National Planning Policy Framework sets out a presumption that development in the green belt is inappropriate. An exception applies for extensions or alterations to existing buildings provided the openness of the green belt is preserved and provided there are no conflicts with the purposes of including the site in the green belt."

"In this case, the Committee considered that the proposals did not include any significant material spread of development beyond the existing development envelope and that the openness of the green belt was preserved. By concluding that there was no harm to the green belt, there was therefore no need to engage the very special circumstances test," Andreasen said.

"The applications are referable to the mayor of London who may choose to recover them for his determination. Whilst former Mayor Boris Johnson did not call in the previous proposals for the site, this new resolution comes shortly after Sadiq Khan issued a statement pledging to oppose building on London's green belt.  It will therefore be interesting to see if he takes a different approach to Johnson," Andreasen said.