FOI - Planning appeals [Jan 2026]

1. The total amount spent by the GLA on legal fees, external consultants, and administrative costs for defending planning appeals.
2. The total number of planning appeals defended by the GLA (if an appeal crosses a financial year please include it in the same year as the costs were paid).
3. The total amount paid out to appellants (third parties) following a decision by the Planning Inspectorate that the GLA acted "unreasonably" (Awards of Costs).
4. The total number of instances where costs were paid out to appellants (third parties) following a decision by the Planning Inspectorate that the GLA acted "unreasonably" (Awards of Costs).

Our response

1. Please find attached. You will note that we have only been able to provide the total amount spent by the GLA on legal fees, external consultants, and administrative costs for the most recent case Stag Brewery. Unfortunately, we have estimated that the cost of complying with your request in full would exceed the “appropriate limit” specified in the Freedom of Information and Data Protection (Appropriate Limit and Fees) Regulation 2004 SI 2004 No 3244. These are known as the ‘Fees Regulations’ for brevity. Section 12 of the Act provides that a public authority is not obliged to comply with a request if the cost of determining whether we hold the information, locating and retrieving it and extracting it from other information would exceed the appropriate limit.
   

   Financial year	Own legal/appeal costs (£)	Number of planning appeals defended	Costs paid due to "Unreasonable" decision (£)	Number of instances where costs were paid for “Unreasonable” decision
   2010-11		0
   2011-12		0
   2012-13		0
   2013-14		1- Heathrow Airport, Northern Runway, Cranford Agreement	0	0
   2014-15		0
   2015-16		2 - City Airport and Flamingo Park	0	0
   2016-17		0
   2017-18		0
   2018-19		4 - Harrow School: Free Grammar School of John Lyon (Harrow School) Land at Harrow School, 5 High Street, Harrow, HA1 3HP Heythrop College, Land at 20 Bury St  and Howbury Park	112730	1
   2019-20		2 - VIP Trading Estate & Conington Road	0	0
   2020-21		2 - Citroen Site and Newcombe House	0	0
   2021-22		1 - Westferry Printworks	0	0
   2022-23		0
   2023-24	Less than £410,000	1- Stag Brewery	N/A	N/A
   2024-25 (to date)		0

    

2. The total number of planning appeals defended by the GLA (including those appeals where the GLA is an interested party) is 13.
3. There is one instance where an award of costs to appellants has been awarded following a decision by the Planning Inspectorate that the GLA acted "unreasonably" (Awards of Costs) and these costs have yet to be made.
4. As per the above in point 3, costs have yet to paid in relation to the only award.