Planning conditions: the national restrictions on drafting

A planning condition has to pass six tests before it can lawfully be imposed: necessary, relevant to planning, relevant to the development permitted, enforceable, precise, and reasonable in all other respects. National guidance states them, the courts sit behind them, and a condition failing any one of them is vulnerable. For an architect assembling a submission, the practical consequence is that you can argue conditions down, and you can draft better ones than the ones you will otherwise be given.

The other restriction worth knowing is procedural. Since 2018 a council cannot impose a pre-commencement condition without the applicant's written agreement, having first served notice of the proposed condition and its reasons.

The six tests and where they come from

The tests appear in national policy and are developed in the Planning Practice Guidance on the use of planning conditions. Behind them sits the older common law position from Newbury District Council v Secretary of State for the Environment: a condition must be imposed for a planning purpose, must fairly and reasonably relate to the permitted development, and must not be so unreasonable that no reasonable authority could have imposed it.

Necessity is the test that does most of the work. A condition repeating a statutory requirement under other legislation is unnecessary, which is why conditions requiring compliance with the Building Regulations or with an environmental permit should be resisted. So are conditions restating what the approved drawings already show.

Precision is the test most often failed in drafting. "Landscaping shall be carried out to a high standard" is unenforceable because nobody can say when it has been breached. "All planting shall be carried out in the first planting season following first occupation, and any plant which dies within five years shall be replaced in the following planting season" can be enforced, because the trigger and the obligation are both defined.

Conditions that cannot lawfully be imposed

Some categories fail at the first hurdle.

• Conditions requiring the payment of money or other consideration, which belong in a section 106 obligation rather than in a condition.
• Conditions requiring works on land outside the application site that the applicant does not control, unless drafted as a negative condition preventing development until something happens, where there is a reasonable prospect of it happening.
• Conditions that would alter the substance of the development described in the application, which is a matter for a revised application.
• Conditions that duplicate controls under other regulatory regimes without any planning purpose.
• Conditions removing the statutory right to apply for permission or to appeal.

Conditions restricting occupation to named people, or requiring the removal of a building after a period, are lawful in limited circumstances but need clear justification. Where a proposal depends on a personal circumstance, ask whether the council will accept a temporary permission instead, since the enforcement consequences differ.

The requirement to agree pre-commencement conditions

Section 100ZA of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990 prevents the grant of permission subject to a pre-commencement condition unless the applicant has agreed to it in writing. Regulations made in 2018 set out the notice procedure and the period in which the applicant must respond.

The sequence in practice runs like this.

1. The officer sends notice of the proposed pre-commencement condition with the reason for it and a draft of the wording.
2. The applicant has a set period, currently ten working days under the regulations, to give or withhold agreement, or to propose different wording. Check the current period before relying on it.
3. If the applicant does not respond within the period, the condition can be imposed anyway.
4. If the applicant refuses and the council considers the condition essential, the application may be refused, or the condition redrafted so that it bites at a later trigger.

The last option is where the value sits. Many conditions drafted as pre-commencement do not need to be. Contamination investigation does need to precede ground works. A landscaping scheme rarely needs to precede anything except planting, and a condition triggered by first occupation costs the programme nothing. Read the notice and propose the alternative trigger rather than simply agreeing.

Silence is agreement by default, so a notice sitting unread in an inbox for a fortnight costs you the point.

Conditions requiring further approval

Details reserved by condition are discharged by application to the authority, with a fee for each request. Two points save time.

Group the conditions into one submission where the details are ready, because the fee is charged per request rather than per condition. And check whether the deemed discharge provisions in section 74A apply, which allow an applicant to serve notice and treat certain conditions as discharged if the authority does not determine the application in time. Several categories are excluded, including conditions on EIA development and some highways and flood risk matters, so read the exclusions before serving notice.

A condition requiring approval of details before any development begins, where the details cannot sensibly be produced before a contractor is appointed, is the classic programme killer. Raise it while the decision is still in draft.

Challenging a condition after grant

Three routes, each with a different risk profile.

An appeal against the condition under section 78 must be made within the time limit for appeals, and the inspector considers the condition rather than the permission as a whole. This is the route where the condition is plainly unlawful or unreasonable.

A section 73 application seeks permission to develop without complying with a condition, and the authority may only consider the question of the conditions. It results in a new permission sitting alongside the original. The Court of Appeal in Finney v Welsh Ministers held that section 73 cannot be used to change the description of the development itself, which is why a variation that alters what is being built needs a fresh application.

A non-material amendment under section 96A deals with small changes and is quick, though what counts as non-material is for the authority to judge.

As at September 2026, section 73B of the 1990 Act, inserted by the Levelling-up and Regeneration Act 2023, provides a wider route for varying permissions. Check its commencement and any regulations before advising a client to rely on it, and follow developments through the planning law updates timeline.

Drafting suggestions officers accept

Offer wording. Case officers are usually working to a deadline with a standard condition library, and a well-drafted alternative that meets the same purpose is often adopted with light editing.

Four habits make suggested conditions acceptable. Tie the trigger to a defined event, such as first occupation of the building or the commencement of above-ground works rather than commencement of development. State the obligation in the active voice with a named actor. Include the reason, referenced to a development plan policy. And keep the scope to what the evidence supports, since a condition demanding more than the assessment justifies fails the necessity test.

Prior approval regimes have their own conditions attached by the order itself, which cannot be negotiated in the same way, as set out in the limits and conditions on Class MA prior approval. And on tall residential schemes, fire safety matters conditioned at planning stage interact with the later checkpoints described in the Building Safety Act gateways explained for applicants.

PlanScope drafts the supporting statements that justify a scheme, and a clear policy justification is what lets you argue a condition down to what the evidence supports. Browse the 66 report types to see which your application needs. PlanScope provides AI-assisted draft reports for planning applications. Reports should be reviewed before submission. We do not guarantee planning approval.

This is general guidance, not legal advice. Check the current legislation and guidance, or take advice from a qualified professional, before relying on it.