Opinions split over justice secretary's vision of special planning court for large-scale building projects

The Ministry of Justice is considering the establishment of a specialist planning court to speed up the review process for large-scale infrastructure projects, as part of a "radical" set of proposals to reform public law and speed up the economic recovery.

An eight-week consultation on a raft of proposed changes to the judicial review system was announced by Justice Secretary Chris Grayling (pictured) last week, including a separate 'planning chamber' staffed by expert judges; a tighter timeframe for applications; only allowing people with a direct interest in cases to apply for judicial review; and changing the rules around who has to pay legal costs so applicants foot part of the bill.

SJ Berwin London real estate head Simon Ricketts said: "It's the most radical set of public law reforms I've ever seen from a UK government and will be a significant root-and-branch shake-up of the judicial review process. 

"Set out individually, most of the changes are very sensible or are heading along the right lines, but there are some elements which will be no doubt controversial. 

"I wouldn't want to see the baby being thrown out with the bathwater because of controversy over the more radical proposals."

These proposed prohibitions on groups applying for judicial reviews – which could extend so far as banning objections from local authorities and pressure groups, such as the High Speed 2 protest group HS2 Action Alliance – have raised fears that the proposals could be challenged under human rights legislation.

However, planning lawyers have welcomed the proposal to have specialist judges sitting in specialist courts. 

"It's a good thing that they will have specialist judges that understand the planning system," said Marnix Elsenaar, head of planning at Addleshaw Goddard. "That will change the process and get things done more quickly."

Nigel Hewitson, head of planning at Norton Rose Fulbright, added: "Having that specialist understanding has got to save time in terms of barristers not having to explain the background to cases."

Martin Evans, head of planning at Nabarro, also welcomed the proposals, but said there was still room for improvement: "There is legislation in place where if you have a full planning permission and there is a judicial review, you get an extra year on the deadline for implementation, and that doesn't exist on outline applications. That's an anomaly and should be corrected."

These proposals follow changes in July that stopped people from having a 'second chance' hearing if their initial written application was ruled totally without merit by a judge, as well as cutting the time limit for applying for reviews of planning decisions from three months to six weeks.