[2025] EWCA Civ 1134

The judge appears to have given very little weight to the desirability of preserving the status quo. Both as a matter of planning law (because an enforcement notice cannot be used to prevent an anticipated future breach) and as a matter of general American Cyanamid principles there is a great difference between an application to prevent a change of use which has not yet occurred and an application where the alleged breach has been going on, intermittently, for several years.

The desirability of preserving the status quo for a limited period before a trial is also to be taken into account when assessing the balance of the risk of doing an injustice. In this context the risk of injustice to the residents of the Bell by being dispersed by 12 September, when the trial of the claim was to take place only some six weeks later, seems to have had oddly little resonance with the judge.