Tesco Vs Lidl – Horley Front Line

Britain’s biggest supermarket group has failed in its High Court challenge to stop a budget chain from moving across a Surrey town. Tesco challenged Reigate and Banstead Borough Council’s planning permission to allow Lidl to build a new store in Horley at the Air Balloon pub.

Tesco’s application for a judicial review argued that the council’s planning committee, which approved the new supermarket by nine votes to two last October, failed to give enough weight to the Grade II listed building’s preservation. The company, which uses the slogan ‘every little helps’ also argued that there was not a strong enough case that the benefit of the development outweighed the harms.

James Strachan KC sitting as a deputy judge of the High Court, disagreed and threw out Tesco’s bid. Instead, he said that the socio-economic benefits were sufficient to grant planning permission. Lidl wants to relocate from what it describes as its not-fit-for-purpose town centre site in Horley into to its new venue in Brighton Road.

As part of the planning process Lidl conducted a public consultation, delivering 12,750 leaflets together with an online survey – getting 2,183 responses, of which 91.5 per cent backed the bid.

Councillor Simon Parnell, chairman of the Reigate and Banstead Borough Council’s Planning Committee, said: “This is an excellent judgement which upholds the decision of the planning committee. Most planning applications give rise to some level of harm which must be balanced against the benefits of a proposal. This balancing exercise was robustly debated at the planning committee meeting and the Committee was fully entitled to come to the decision it did, as this judgement demonstrates.”

The plans to demolish the Air Balloon Pub and replace it with a new store were first submitted by Lidl in 2022. Tesco requested permission to apply for judicial review of the decision on three grounds but was only given permission to challenge on how the council dealt with listed buildings.

The case finally reached the High Court on June 5 2024 with the judgement handed down this month (September). Tesco and Lidl have been approached for comment.