By Lynda Myer
The National Highways’ Stonehenge Tunnel scheme a development consent order, is encountering a legal challenge by Save Stonehenge World Heritage Site against the government’s decision to grant this project.
Following a lengthy period of redetermination, the transport secretary Mark Harper issued the planning approval for this project earlier this month
Constructing a new 12.8km dual carriageway including a 3.3km tunnel past the Stonehenge World Heritage Site, the A3030 Amesbury to Berwick Down scheme has £1.7bn value.
Although in November 2020, this project was initially given approval by former transport secretary Grant Shapps, against the Planning Inspectorate’s recommendation, this was overturned by the High Court who ruled that his decision was unlawful, and then with continues endeavor of Department for Transport (DfT) and National Highways it was approved again.
Considering the report of GE’s sister title NCE, the new development consent order (DCO) approval started a six-week period in which legal objections could be made, whereas a campaign alliance called Save Stonehenge World Heritage Site (SSWHS) has now started the process by sending the government a pre-application protocol letter outlining its concerns about the decision. This is a precursor to filing a judicial review.
SSWHS is represented by law firm Leigh Day and barristers David Wolfe KC, Victoria Hutton and Stephanie David.
According to group’s statement, the government’s decision to grant the DCO was unlawful because:
- Given recent developments and key new evidence, it was procedurally unfair for the secretary of state not to subject the re-determination to a full public re-examination
- It was irrational for the secretary of state to give no weight to the risk that the scheme would result in Stonehenge having its World Heritage Status removed
- The secretary of state failed to consider diverting the road around the Stonehenge site, despite such an alternative having a far lower impact in heritage terms
- The secretary of state failed to properly assess the scheme’s climate change impact, owing to:
- applying roads policy which pre-dated the net zero target
- treating the draft new roads policy as immaterial
- ignoring the new national net zero strategy
- assessing emissions from this scheme alone, without factoring in the emission from the whole A303/A358 corridor upgrade in the south west peninsular
- ignoring climate change adaptation
SSWHS co-director Chris Todd said: “The government has stuck two fingers up at Unesco and all those who care about our British heritage. It has basically approved this highly flawed and damaging proposal for a second time. The same scheme that was thrown out in 2021. We believe there are strong grounds why this approval should also be struck down. We will do everything within our power to safeguard this most iconic of sites for future generations.”
“There is an unfortunate sense of déjà vu. It appears that, yet again, the Government has ignored warnings that this road scheme will put at risk the world heritage status of Stonehenge. Despite calls by the World Heritage Committee for the decision to be delayed until it had met, the secretary of state went ahead and reinstated development consent, without holding another public examination. It will be argued that this unfairness, combined with a failure to properly assess the scheme’s climate change impact, rendered the Secretary of State’s decision unlawful for a second time. If the Government, following correspondence, refuses to accept that, then our client intends to launch another claim for judicial review,” said Leigh Day solicitor Rowan Smith.
