KB-2025-002908 - [2025] EWHC 2937 (KB)

At 10.42am on 8 April 2025, Mr Stubbs emailed Mr Salmon and the Defendant’s solicitor in respect of the Bell –

“I write concerning the land mentioned above, which remains under the ownership of Somani Hotels Limited. It has been brought to the local planning authority’s attention that the use of the former hotel as a hostel for asylum seekers is to resume.

You will recall that an application seeking permission for such a temporary change of use was submitted in February 2023 and subsequently withdrawn in March 2024, following the cessation of the use of the premises. A new application will now be required, and I would be grateful to receive an indication of your intentions in this regard”.

On the same day, a Bell Hotel, Epping Health and Welfare meeting was held, attended by Ms Ferdenzi and Ms Thompson amongst others. The minutes of that meeting record that a fire had occurred at the Bell on the morning of Saturday 5 April 2025. The fire had been confined to a single room at the hotel. An asylum seeker had been arrested on suspicion of arson at both the Phoenix and the Bell hotels and remanded into custody to appear in court on 5 May 2025. I was told that he is presently awaiting trial at the Crown Court.

At 16.30pm on 8 April 2025, Ms Thompson emailed Ms Ferdenzi in the following terms –

“Further to our discussion today, I have been advised that we expect a response to our email correspondence regarding the lack of appropriate planning consent within 7 calendar days from Somani Hotels Limited, i.e. no later than 17.00 15/04/25, following which, if this is not received the Council will reserve the right to take appropriate enforcement action this could include a temporary stop notice (TSN) which has immediate effect for a period of 56 days”.

In her evidence to the court, Ms Thompson said that the Claimant was alive to the fact that the new use of the Bell hotel did not have planning permission, and took steps to raise this with Somani. I understood this to be a reference to Mr Stubbs’ email to Mr Salmon on the morning of 8 April 2025. Ms Thompson also said in evidence that she discussed the lack of planning permission for the change of use with CTM and the Home Office shortly after the new use commenced. Aside from Ms Thompson’s email of 8 April 2025 to Ms Ferdenzi, there appears to be no contemporaneous record of those discussions.

On the morning of 17 April 2025, Ms Thompson forwarded her email of 8 April 2025 to Mr Stubbs and asked him whether there had been any response from Somani Hotels. Mr Stubbs replied that he had heard neither from the Defendant nor their solicitor. Ms Thompson then asked –

“Can we now look at the feasibility of enforcement by way of a stop notice?”

Mr Stubbs responded to that request as follows –

“We can, I think this would benefit from a wider discussion given the implications of a stop notice i.e. requiring the occupants to cease residing in the building and the consequences of that. To date we have not received a formal complaint alleging a breach of planning control from any member of the public, and there doesn’t appear to be a groundswell of pressure for planning enforcement action to be taken at this time. There may be merit in pursuing the landowner and possibly issuing a planning contravention notice before escalating”.

Immediately after writing that email, Mr Stubbs chased Mr Salmon for a response to his earlier email of 8 April 2025. He said –

“In the absence of this engagement the LPA will need to consider whether enforcement action is appropriate. We will contact you shortly to set out those steps that will now need to be taken to remedy the current breach of planning control”.

It appears from the email chain that there may have been an internal discussion between officers later in the afternoon on 17 April 2025. Also on 17 April 2025, Ms Thompson and Ms Wiggins were copied into an email from Mr Blackburn to Home Office colleagues in which he wrote –

“Epping have advised that they have no record of a change of use application for the use of the Bell for asylum seekers. This feels like an old ongoing matter, as I have always understood there was no planning permission of change of use application required for using hotels, can you advise what the correct situation is, as the Council are struggling to get a response back from the Hotel Owner and they are threatening imposing a stop notice on using the hotel”.

On 22 April 2025, Mr Salmon emailed Mr Stubbs apologising for the delay in responding to him and saying that the Defendant awaited further guidance from the Home Office before being in a position to confirm how to proceed. On 23 April 2025, Mr Salmon emailed Mr Stubbs to follow up a phone call on the previous day and said –

“As promised, I have chased this up again with the Home Office and can confirm that we will be reapplying for a temporary change of use. Can you please let me know next steps”.

On the same day Mr Stubbs replied –

“Thanks for confirming your intention to submit an application in respect of the current unauthorised use of the premises. Whilst I am unable to frame the wording of any proposed application, it is assumed that this would address the material change of use that has occurred from a hotel (use class C1) to that of a hostel for asylum seekers (sui generis use), and your intention for the current use to continue for a temporary period.

You may wish to revisit a previous application submitted by Somani Holdings Limited on 14 February 2023, as many of the supporting documents are likely to remain pertinent. An application may be submitted to the Council online via the Planning Portal…I would be grateful if you could propose a suggested timeframe for the submission of this application”.

Mr Salmon immediately replied –

“Thanks James, we will start working on this, but it all falls on my desk and I am away for couple of weeks. Therefore, the submission is likely to be made towards the end of next month”.

Mr Stubbs then emailed the Claimant’s Director of Planning and Ms Thompson to say that he was minded to accept Mr Salmon’s proposed timeframe “given that enforcement action, at this time, is not proposed. Let me know if you disagree”. The Director of Planning responded that he was inclined to agree to allow time for the Defendant to submit the planning application, as it had committed to doing so, but that the Defendant should not be allowed to delay matters. Ms Thompson agreed.

On 24 April 2025, Mr Stubbs responded –

“Thanks for confirming. We will await the application and monitor the situation in the meantime with respect to the use of the building”.

Meanwhile, also on 24 April 2025 Mr Blackburn gave advance notice of new arrivals at the Bell –

“Following the incident 3 weeks ago, CTM have been working with the hotel to ensure the site is safe and habitable for more arrivals in the affected areas. We have been advised that subject to a lighting and fire alarm test the upper floor should be ready for use from as early as the 25^th April. This will provide us with 20 useable rooms. With that in mind we will plan for the next 30 arrivals which could arrive either tomorrow or Monday next week”.

Ms Thompson said that following a request by Ms Wiggins on 30 April 2025, from 30 April 2025 the Claimant received weekly emails from the Home Office, setting out in tabular form demographic data for asylum seekers accommodated at the Bell. The data provided consisted of the gender, age, school year group and language of each asylum seeker.

On 15 May 2025, Mr Salmon emailed Mr Stubbs to inform him that he had now been instructed not to proceed with the planning application -

In his evidence to the court, Mr Stubbs confirmed that he had not responded to Mr Salmon’s email. On 16 May 2025, he discussed its contents with the Claimant’s Cabinet Members holding the portfolios of Planning and Regulatory Services, with officers seeking directions as to how to proceed, I understand that the Cabinet Portfolio Holder for Planning was Councillor Williamson and for Regulatory Services was Councillor Keska. Mr Salmon’s email was seen as a “definitive” position. In Mr Stubbs’ words –

“The view taken the next day by the Council was that, whilst it disagreed with the contention that an application for planning permission for a change of use was not required, as things then stood the Council should be guided by the fact that apparently Somani had received ‘advice’ from the Home Office saying that change of use permission was unnecessary, and that accordingly enforcement action should not be taken at that time, with the situation to be monitored”.

Mr Stubbs sought to place emphasis in his evidence to the court on the fact that neither the Defendant nor the Home Office had provided the Claimant with the advice to which Mr Salmon referred in his email of 15 May 2025. It is to be noted that neither Mr Stubbs nor any other official of the Claimant asked the Defendant or the Home Office to provide that advice at that time. Indeed, the Claimant did not ask for a copy of that advice until 14 August 2025, three days after filing the claim form which initiated the present proceedings.