The Second Application
Errors unfixed, the harm now called a benefit
Judicial review AC-2025-LON-004656 · Application 26/02109/FUL · Updated 27 June 2026
Rather than defend the judicial review AC-2025-LON-004656 brought by the Christ's Lane Action Group (CLAG), Christ's College and Cambridge City Council signed a consent order on 28 April 2026 conceding the November 2025 permission should be quashed on all four grounds. Every one turned on how heritage harm was assessed and weighed. The College has now resubmitted the same building as application 26/02109/FUL without fixing those errors. The bulk the first application accepted as heritage harm, the second presents as a heritage benefit.
The permission conceded as unlawful in court
CLAG challenged the November 2025 permission. On 9 March 2026 Mr Justice Kimblin granted permission to proceed on all four grounds. Rather than defend the decision, the College and the Council signed a consent order on 28 April 2026 conceding the permission should be quashed on all four grounds, and the Council agreed to pay CLAG’s costs. A High Court hearing is listed for October 2026. The case reference is AC-2025-LON-004656; the original permission was 25/02161/FUL.
Four grounds. All conceded. None defended.
- 1Historic England warned of harm. Councillors never heard it. Members were led to believe Historic England saw no heritage harm. The opposite was true: the statutory adviser had identified harm to the setting of the listed buildings. The committee voted on facts that weren’t real.
- 2The heritage balance that never balanced. One question decides everything: does the scheme harm heritage, and do the benefits outweigh that harm? The report never answered it. No finding of harm. No honest weighing.
- 3“Optimum viable use”: a benefit that didn’t exist, weighed as if it did. The new library was credited with securing the “optimum viable use” of College buildings that were already in secure, continuous use. A phantom benefit went on the scales and tipped them in the scheme’s favour.
- 4The less harmful alternatives that were disregarded. A lower-bulk scheme already had consent, and Create Streets produced a recent lower-impact design. Yet the committee was told not to consider them, and that the oversized bulky scheme was the only way.
The conceded permission, resubmitted uncorrected
Having signed on 28 April 2026 to concede the first permission should be quashed on all four grounds, the College weeks later resubmitted the scheme as 26/02109/FUL, without correcting any of the four conceded errors. 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 two material facts: that the College had already signed to concede the first permission was unlawful, and that in the new application, the very bulk Historic England had flagged as harm was now being presented as a benefit.
The public was told no more. On its own website, the College announced the resubmission 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 concession, or that the heritage case had been reversed.
Was the judicial review about process, or the heritage case?
The College repeats, in the Bursar’s letter, on its website, and in its Covering Statement, that the application is “unchanged” because the judicial review concerned “the Council’s decision-making process, not the design,” and “the process involved in determining the original application, not the planning merits.” That is a false distinction.
What was conceded as unlawful was the heritage case on which permission was granted. Historic England’s harm was not put fairly before councillors. The heritage balance was never properly carried out. A non-existent “optimum viable use” benefit was weighed in the scheme’s favour. Less harmful alternatives were wrongly pushed aside. That was not a side issue; it was the case for the building.
The resubmission corrects none of it. The four errors stand. And the harm is now presented as a benefit. The first time, the harm had at least to be weighed; this time, the College says there is no harm to weigh at all. The bulk the first application accepted as harm requiring a public-benefit balance, the second presents as a benefit, the College writing that “the need to apply public benefits to outweigh heritage harms does not… apply here” (Covering Statement, para 3.16) because it does “not recognise any harm” at all.
The errors stand. The harm now called a benefit.
Object before 9 July 2026
The same building is back as 26/02109/FUL, with its heritage case reversed. The consultation closes on 9 July 2026. Make your objection count, quote reference 26/02109/FUL.
Email objections to Dominic.Bush@greatercambridgeplanning.org quoting ref. 26/02109/FUL.