Appeals

The Dean of Arches refused the Victorian Society leave to appeal against the decision of the Chancellor of the Diocese to allow the replacement of the Abbey's nave pews with chairs.

Decision on costs in respect of the Re Bath Abbey [2018] EACC 1.

The Dean of Arches granted leave to appeal against the decision of the Deputy Chancellor in Re Cheshunt Cemetery (No. 2) [2018] ECC StA 2 not to allow the exhumation of the cremated remains of the petitioners' baby son. Leave was granted on two grounds: (a) the Deputy Chancellor was wrong ... to categorise the Appellants’ case as “one of change of mind rather than a (potentially operative) type of mistake ... namely a lack of understanding as to the significance of interment in consecrated ground”; and (b) the Deputy Chancellor thereby failed to consider whether this mistake was capable of constituting exceptional circumstances within the law as laid down in Re Blagdon Cemetery [2002] Fam. 299 and/or to explain why this was not so.

Leave to appeal granted by the Court of Arches on limited grounds.

Spitalfields Open Space Limited and others v The Governing Body of Christ Church Primary School and others (No 2) [2019] EACC 1

In 2012/13 a building (“the Nursery”) was erected on part of the disused, but still consecrated, churchyard to the south-east of Christ Church, Spitalfields, in the diocese of London. The Nursery was erected unlawfully, in contravention of section 3 of the Disused Burial Grounds Act 1884, which prohibits the erection of buildings in consecrated churchyards. In December 2017 the acting Deputy Chancellor of the Diocese of London issued a confirmatory faculty in respect of the Nursery, and refused to make a restoration order requiring the demolition of the Nursery.  She also held that Spitalfields Open Space Limited did not have a sufficient interest to take part in the legal proceedings. On an appeal to the Court of Arches, the Court determined that:
(1) Spitalfields Open Space Limited had a sufficient interest;
(2) the Consistory Court had not had the power to grant a confirmatory faculty;
(3) an application by a Mr. Ouvry to intervene in the appeal should be refused;
(4) it was appropriate to make a restoration order, requiring the demolition of the Nursery.
(5) to allow time for the occupants of the Nursery to relocate, the restoration of the site need not be completed until 1 February 2029.

A order relating to costs and other matters in respect of the Court of Arches judgment in Re Christ Church Spitalfields [2019] EACC 1, which resulted in the making of a restoration order requiring the demolition of the children's nursery building erected on the closed churchyard.

There had been a faculty application to authorise the installation of telecommunications equipment at the church and the completion of a licence agreement between the Parochial Church Council and the telecommunications operator. The Chancellor had refused to grant a faculty. The petitioners appealed. The appeal was allowed. The court found that the Chancellor had unnecessarily given weight to the church's primary responsibility being mission, an argument which had not been put forward by the objectors, and had not given sufficient weight to the evidence in favour of the proposals, particularly that the Government had issued guidelines to planning authorities that planning consent should not be refused for telecommunications equipment on the grounds of arguments as to danger to human health, if installations complied with international guidelines.

In 2009, the Chancellor of the Diocese of Lichfield refused to grant a faculty for the introduction a raised area at the east end of the nave and the moving of four pews from the south aisle to the north aisle to allow space for a ramp to the raised area. The appeal was allowed.

Appeal allowed against the refusal by the Chancellor of the Diocese to grant a Faculty to authorise the relocation of the chancel screen.

An appeal by the Victorian Society against the decision of the Chancellor of the Diocese of Rochester to allow the removal from the church of a Victorian eight bay screen by Bodley & Garner and its reinstallation in a church in Leicestershire, which would necessitate the reduction of the screen by two bays. Appeal dismissed.