The Second Application
In the College's Own Words
Judicial review AC-2025-LON-004656 · Application 26/02109/FUL · Updated Monday 19 October 2026
On 20 October 2026 the High Court quashed the November 2025 permission, 25/02161/FUL, on all four grounds of the judicial review, R (Christ's Lane Action Group) v Cambridge City Council, Christ's College Cambridge interested party, AC-2025-LON-004656; the Council's letter to the Court of 28 April 2026 says the position "is not materially different from if the Defendant and Interested Party had conceded the claim on all grounds". Every ground turned on how heritage harm was assessed and weighed. While the first application was still before the High Court, the College resubmitted the same building as 26/02109/FUL with errors repeated, and the bulk the experts term heritage harm presented as a heritage benefit. The Bursar wrote to all 42 councillors assuring them the application was unchanged, and did not mention the draft consent order the College had signed weeks earlier agreeing that its permission should be quashed. And when 75 residents petitioned for the public Forum they are entitled to, the College refused to attend it. Below, the pitch in the College's own words: the covering statement, the Bursar's email, the refused request for a public Forum, and the College's own open meeting.
The permission the High Court quashed
CLAG challenged the November 2025 permission, 25/02161/FUL. By an order signed on 6 March 2026 and served on 9 March, Mr Justice Kimblin granted permission to proceed on all four grounds. On Tuesday 20 October 2026 the High Court quashed the first permission, 25/02161/FUL, on all four grounds of our claim. The hearing took place in Court 18 at the Royal Courts of Justice, before Mr Justice Kolinsky, in R (Christ's Lane Action Group) v Cambridge City Council, AC-2025-LON-004656, in the Planning Court. The case reference is AC-2025-LON-004656; the original permission was 25/02161/FUL.
Four grounds, none defended.
All four grounds, every one concerning how heritage harm was assessed and weighed, are explained here and reproduced in full here. The Council's own report of 28 September 2026 says the Council and the College "have conceded in writing to all four grounds of challenge".
The permission the High Court quashed, resubmitted uncorrected
While the first application was still before the High Court, the College resubmitted the scheme as 26/02109/FUL, with errors repeated. It did so expressly so the Council could "re-consider the application more quickly," "rather than wait for the application to be referred back to the Council by the High Court" (Covering Statement, para 2.2). The Bursar then wrote to all 42 councillors promoting the scheme and assuring them nothing had changed.
What the College didn't tell councillors or the public
The Bursar's email to all 42 councillors did not mention a material fact: that the College had already signed a draft consent order agreeing that the first permission should be quashed on all four grounds. The public was told no more. On its own website, the College announced the resubmission, 26/02109/FUL, as a routine step, stating only that "the application is unchanged as the Judicial Review relates to the Council's decision-making process, not to the design" (Christ's College, "Library planning application submitted"), with no mention of the signed order.
The Forum they refused to attend
On 1 July 2026, 75 signatories petitioned the Council for a Development Control Forum, the formal public meeting residents are entitled to request. The College declined to attend, assuring the Council that a meeting "will not generate any new information", and the Council cancelled the Forum the same day. A day later the Council's Senior Planning Lawyer reinstated it, citing the petition's strict compliance with the requirements. The petition, with the email chain recording the refusal and the cancellation, is published in full: The Public Forum the College Tried to Cancel (PDF).
The meeting they talked over
On 6 July the College held its own open meeting. CLAG's record of it is worth reading in full. Pressed on the heritage bodies' findings of harm, the Master dismissed the Victorian Society as merely "one of the 22" consultees and "not custodians of a building from the Tudor era", and maintained the College does "not believe there is net heritage harm" at all. Asked why the College had signed away its permission rather than await the October judgment, he told a resident: "I am now going to talk over you deliberately." A senior academic's closing charge went unanswered: that the College thinks it "knows better than the court" and "knows better than the heritage body". The College's Open Meeting: The Record.
Was the judicial review about process, or the heritage case?
The College has said since June 2026 that the judicial review was about the Council's "decision-making process", not the building. On 20 October 2026, the day the High Court quashed the permission, its website called the hearing "a procedural hearing".
No. The High Court quashed the first permission, 25/02161/FUL, on all four grounds of our claim, and the judge recorded "errors of approach on each of the grounds". Every ground is about this building.
Historic England found the building "too big for its location" and "overdominant on this space". The Council's report kept that finding of harm from councillors and told them the overall impact was neutral. It told them the scheme would secure the listed buildings' "optimum viable use", a benefit for bringing a vacant or underused listed building back into use, when these buildings were already in use. The Council had twice granted permission for a lower library on this site, and councillors were never asked whether it would avoid the harm.
An officer's report that correctly weighted the harm, did not include phantom benefits, considered alternatives, and did not introduce new errors, would have led to a different result.
The College resubmitted the same building as application 26/02109/FUL, with the errors repeated. Its Covering Statement says it does "not recognise any harm". The Council's 2026 report again counts the continued use of the listed buildings as a benefit, with "significant weight". The identical application 26/02109/FUL, approved on 7 October, is frozen by the Secretary of State.
The first permission is quashed. The second is frozen.
On Tuesday 20 October 2026 the High Court quashed the first approval, 25/02161/FUL, on all four grounds of our claim. The Secretary of State has frozen the permission. On 13 October she directed the Council not to grant it without her authorisation while she considers whether to call the application in, six days after the identical application 26/02109/FUL was controversially approved. If you would like to support a call in, write to us and we will tell you how.
Email residents@christs-lane.com.