Supreme Court refuses local resident permission to appeal in dispute over low traffic neighbourhoods and public sector equality duty

The Supreme Court has refused permission for an appeal over Lambeth Council’s decision to test run the designation of certain areas as low traffic neighbourhoods (LTNs).

LTNs are areas where vehicular traffic is restricted to promote walking and cycling and to discourage, limit or prohibit the use of motor vehicles.

The background to the case of R (on the application of Sheakh) v London Borough of Lambeth was that in November 2019, as part of its Transport Strategy, the local authority aimed to start introducing LTNs within three years.

In doing so, it hoped to deter “rat running” of cars through local neighbourhoods, to improve air quality and to help achieve carbon neutrality by 2030.

In May 2020, Lambeth conferred legal authority on an officer working at the council to introduce LTNs via experimental traffic orders under s9 Road Traffic Regulation Act 1984. In October 2020, the relevant officer decided to make experimental traffic orders to introduce LTNs in Streatham Hill and Railton in Lambeth (other LTNs that existed in Lambeth prior to and after this date were not the subject of this appeal).

The officer relied on a report which said that: “The Assistant Director for Highways, Capital Programmes & Sustainability has approved the project team’s assessment that there is a reasonable expectation that the measures will not disproportionately affect people with […] protected characteristics. The veracity of this conclusion will be explored as part of the six-month post-implementation consultation period”.

The appellant was a resident of Lambeth Borough who lives a short distance from a LTN. She is physically disabled and unable to use public transport. As a result, the appellant is highly reliant on the use of her car to make journeys.

The appellant argued that she had suffered disproportionately by the introduction of LTNs because the displacement of traffic to roads outside the LTN has led to a build-up of traffic, consequently increasing her journey times, adding to her stress and reducing her quality of life through increased traffic pollution.

She said that the respondent council had failed to have due regard to the impacts on disabled people when deciding to implement the LTNs and had therefore failed to comply with its public sector equality duty under the Equality Act 2010. She therefore sought statutory review of that decision.

The appellant’s claims were dismissed by the High Court and in Sheakh, R (On the Application Of) v London Borough of Lambeth Council [2022] EWCA Civ 457 by the Court of Appeal. She sought permission to appeal to the Supreme Court.

The issue was: Whether the respondent discharged its public sector equality duty under section 149 of the Equality Act 2010, when deciding to make experimental traffic orders under section 9 of the Road Traffic Regulation Act 1984 creating low traffic neighbourhoods in Lambeth.

However, a Supreme Court panel comprising Lord Reed, Lady Rose and Lord Richards refused permission to appeal last month [the latest permission decisions were published this week] “because the appeal does not raise an arguable point of law of general public importance which the court should determine at this time”.