Part 4 Class C: temporary use as a state-funded school

Part 4 Class C of the General Permitted Development Order 2015 lets a building and its curtilage be used as a state-funded school for up to two academic years without planning permission. It was written for a specific problem: a new free school or an academy that has approval to open but no permanent site ready, needing somewhere to teach from in September. No other temporary use right runs for anything like that long.

Two academic years is the ceiling, and it is not renewable by starting again on the same site.

What the right permits and for how long

The class permits a change of use of a building and any land within its curtilage to use as a state-funded school. The period runs for up to two academic years, which is a longer and differently measured window than the day-based allowances elsewhere in Part 4, because a school year does not fit a calendar count.

The right is conditional. The developer has to notify the local planning authority in writing before the use begins, and the class requires the school to have the relevant approval from the Secretary of State, which in practice means the Department for Education's approval of the school itself. At the end of the period the building and land revert to their previous lawful use.

Read the current text of the class before relying on it. Part 4 has been amended several times, and the notification requirement and the definition of a state-funded school are both drafted precisely.

One point that is easy to miss: this is a change of use right. It does not authorise building operations. Modular classrooms, a new entrance canopy, a hard play surface or boundary fencing above the permitted limits are operational development and need their own permission or their own permitted development right.

Which buildings and land qualify

Any building can in principle be used, subject to the exclusions and to the practical question of whether it can lawfully function as a school. In practice the buildings used are redundant offices, former colleges, community buildings, church halls and surplus public sector accommodation.

The exclusions follow the usual Part 4 pattern. Listed buildings and scheduled monuments are outside the right, as are sites of special scientific interest, safety hazard areas and military explosives storage areas. Check the designations on the national mapping services first, because a church hall in a conservation area with a curtilage-listed relationship to the church is a trap that only shows up on the heritage layers.

The deliverability question is separate and harder. A school needs a workable means of escape, sanitary provision at the right ratios, acoustic separation, ventilation, accessible routes and a safeguarded boundary. The Department for Education's area guidelines and the acoustic standard for school premises set what is expected, and none of that is waived because the use is temporary and permitted.

The notification before the use starts

Serve written notice on the local planning authority before the use begins, by a method that produces evidence. The authority has no power to refuse under this class, so the notice is not an application, but a use that starts before notice has been given is not permitted development, and that is an enforcement risk nobody wants on a school site.

Set out in the notice what the use is, which building and land it covers, the start date and the end date expressed by reference to academic years, and the approval the school holds. Attach a plan with the curtilage outlined.

Then talk to the authority anyway. Highways officers, the environmental health team and the local ward members will be hearing from residents in the first week of term regardless of the legal position, and a council that was told in advance handles those calls very differently from one that was not. The same logic that makes an early conversation worthwhile on a Class MA vacancy and continuous use conversion applies here, with the added factor that a school generates immediate, visible traffic.

Highways, parking and drop-off during the period

This is where temporary school sites go wrong, and it is the issue that generates the complaints that generate the enforcement enquiries.

A school of a few hundred pupils concentrates arrivals into about twenty minutes twice a day. On a site designed as an office with a dozen parking spaces and a single access, that produces queuing on the highway, parking on verges and junction obstruction. The planning right does not require you to address it. The practical consequences do.

What works, in rough order of effect:

• A school travel plan issued before the first day, with staggered start times for different year groups.
• An agreed drop-off arrangement, which may mean a licence to use a nearby car park rather than on-site provision.
• Walking bus and park-and-stride arrangements with a named coordinator.
• Staff parking allocation that does not consume the turning area.
• Liaison with the highway authority about waiting restrictions and school keep clear markings, which take months to deliver and should be requested before term starts.

A short Transport Statement prepared voluntarily is a sensible investment even where no application is required, because it gives the highway authority something to respond to and gives the school a document to show residents.

Returning to the previous lawful use

At the end of the two academic years the use reverts to what it lawfully was before. That is a sentence with real consequences.

Plan the exit from the start. Where the previous use was office or storage, the building has to be capable of going back, so alterations made for the school should be reversible. Where the previous lawful use had itself been abandoned, the reversion may be to nothing useful, which leaves the owner with a building and no established use.

Keep evidence of the previous lawful use on file, with the same care you would apply to the evidential exercise in proving a building was in agricultural use under Class Q. Planning permissions, rates records, leases and dated photographs all help, and they will be needed if the reversion is ever questioned.

Applying for permanent permission in parallel

The right buys time. It does not solve the problem, and two academic years passes quickly once you account for a determination period, a possible appeal and a construction programme.

Run the permanent application alongside the temporary use from the first term. The options are a full planning application for permanent use of the same site, a full application for the intended permanent site, or the separate permitted development route in Part 3 that allows certain buildings to change use to a state-funded school permanently, subject to prior approval on matters including transport and highways, noise, contamination and flooding.

An illustrative example. A new secondary school with approval to open in September takes a vacant three-storey office building under Class C, notifies the authority in June, opens with 180 pupils in Year 7, and operates a staggered timetable with an off-site drop-off licence. In parallel it submits a full application for the permanent site a mile away in the first term, allowing eighteen months for determination, discharge of pre-commencement conditions and a summer handover. The temporary building goes back to office use at the end of the second academic year. That sequence works. Starting the permanent application in the second year does not.

The supporting documents for the permanent application are the substantial piece of work, and a Planning Statement that explains the temporary arrangement, the pupil projections and the transport strategy is the spine of it. Enter the postcode on PlanScope to see which of the 66 report types the permanent site's constraints are likely to trigger.

This is general guidance, not legal advice. A Lawful Development Certificate is the only formal way to confirm that works or a use are lawful, so check the position with your local planning authority or a qualified professional before relying on a permitted development right. PlanScope provides AI-assisted draft reports for planning applications. Reports should be reviewed before submission. We do not guarantee planning approval.