The Tower Hamlets enforcement appeal, decided on 30th September 2026, ended with an accountancy firm failing to overturn a notice requiring office use to cease at the ground floor of a former public house in east London.
Appeal APP/E5900/C/25/3361722 concerned White Horse Road, London. Tower Hamlets alleged a material change of use from a sui generis public house to an office use within Class E. Imperial Accounting Ltd argued that its accountancy business was not an office within Class E(g)(i), but a financial-services use within Class E(c)(i), principally serving visiting members of the public.
Inspector Robin Buchanan accepted that accountancy can potentially fall within the client-facing financial-services part of Use Class E. The problem was evidence. He found too little material showing that, when the notice was issued on 6th February 2025, the ground floor’s primary main use regularly involved receiving clients or potential clients in person.
Does an enforcement notice match what is actually happening?
Ground (b) appeals are evidence-heavy. The wording of the notice, the date it was issued and the factual use of the premises can all decide whether an appeal succeeds. We can review the notice and the evidence before you commit to an appeal strategy.
Why the Tower Hamlets enforcement appeal turned on Class E evidence
The distinction mattered because the enforcement notice described the unauthorised use as an office use in Class E. The appellant treated that as a reference to Class E(g)(i), which covers an office used to carry out operational or administrative functions. Class E(g) also carries an amenity qualification: the use must be capable of operating in a residential area without detriment from the specified effects, including noise, vibration, smell, fumes and dust. That qualification was not the dispute in this appeal.
Imperial Accounting said its activity instead belonged in Class E(c)(i). That part of Class E covers financial services provided principally to visiting members of the public. On the Inspector’s site visit, the company was still occupying the ground floor and there was little doubt that accountancy was its core business.
In paragraph 6, the Inspector accepted that E(c)(i) allows “some remote, incidental client interaction”, as well as some operational and administrative back-office functions. In other words, a business does not cease to be client-facing simply because some work happens remotely or behind the scenes.
What mattered was the “primary main use” at the relevant time. The Inspector said the appellant had produced little objective material, such as a record of client meetings, to demonstrate regular in-person financial-services activity when the notice was issued.
The decisive date in the Tower Hamlets enforcement appeal
That timing point is central to a ground (b) enforcement appeal. Section 174(2)(b) of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990 provides a ground of appeal where the matters alleged in the notice have not occurred. In this case, the Inspector approached the question by asking whether the alleged office use had occurred as a matter of fact by 6th February 2025, the date Tower Hamlets issued the notice.
The burden was on the appellant on the balance of probability. The decision records that later client-facing activity could not repair a lack of evidence about the position at the notice date.
The firm’s explanation did not have to be corroborated in every respect. Even so, the Inspector found it was “not sufficiently precise or unambiguous”, particularly when set against the Council’s enforcement visit and photographs. That made the appellant’s account less likely on the evidence before him.
For practitioners, this is a useful reminder that enforcement appeal grounds are not merely legal labels. A ground (b) case lives or dies on evidence of what had actually happened by the relevant date.
This was not a ruling that E(c)(i) to E(g)(i) needs permission
The Tower Hamlets enforcement appeal should not be read as deciding that a movement between E(c)(i) and E(g)(i) itself requires planning permission.
The starting lawful use here was a sui generis public house. Tower Hamlets alleged that a material change from that pub use to an office use had occurred without planning permission. The dispute under ground (b) was whether the factual use alleged in the notice had in fact occurred, not whether switching between two purposes already within Class E automatically amounts to development.
That distinction matters because article 3(1A) of the Use Classes Order provides, subject to the Order, that in England a change from one purpose to another within the same Schedule 2 class is not to be taken to involve development. Class E(c)(i) and E(g)(i) are both within Class E.
Section 55 of the 1990 Act defines development as including a material change in the use of buildings or land, while section 57 requires planning permission for development. The Inspector therefore corrected the notice so that it expressly alleged a “material” change of use from the former pub.
Planning Geek’s guide to material change of use explains the wider distinction between a change in activity and a change that amounts to development for planning purposes.
The Class E(c)(i) argument was possible, but the proof was too thin
The Tower Hamlets enforcement appeal highlights a practical point for businesses whose premises combine client-facing services with office functions. Professional services have their own provision in E(c)(ii); this decision specifically concerned financial services under E(c)(i).
But the statutory wording requires the service to be provided principally to visiting members of the public. That makes the character of the use a factual question. Evidence such as appointment records, visitor logs, diary entries, reception arrangements, client meeting rooms and contemporaneous descriptions of how the premises operated may therefore be important where the distinction is disputed.
Here, the Inspector referred to the lack of sufficiently precise evidence of regular client visits. Ground (b) failed because Imperial Accounting had not shown, on the balance of probability, that the matter alleged in the notice had not occurred.
Three months became four, but the six-month request failed
The Tower Hamlets enforcement appeal succeeded under ground (g), which concerns whether the compliance period in an enforcement notice is shorter than should reasonably be allowed.
Tower Hamlets had required the office use to cease within three months. Imperial Accounting sought at least six months, arguing that it needed time to find suitable alternative premises and move without disrupting staff, clients or the continuity of the business.
The Inspector was not persuaded that six months was justified. There was little objective evidence that suitable rental accommodation was in particularly short supply, and limited information about staff numbers, other premises or the due diligence undertaken before the company occupied the property.
However, the site visit showed five staff and a substantial quantity of client files. The Inspector accepted that an abrupt move could have serious consequences for people relying on the business. He also noted the Council’s power under section 173A(1)(b) to extend a compliance period after a notice has been issued, while stressing that the period in the notice must be reasonable at the outset.
His conclusion was that planning enforcement should be “remedial, not punitive”. One additional month was “proportionate and justified”, so the compliance period was extended from three months to four. The request for six months was rejected because that would have gone beyond what the evidence justified and would have prolonged the harm identified by the Council.
Our separate guide to section 173A and enforcement notices explains the council’s power to withdraw a notice or waive, relax or extend its requirements after service.
Notice corrections in the Tower Hamlets enforcement appeal
The Inspector also checked the enforcement notice itself. He corrected the allegation by inserting the word “material” before change of use, reflecting the statutory definition of development in section 55. He also changed the requirement from “the Premises” to “the Property” so that the terminology matched the land identified by the notice.
Those corrections did not cause injustice to either party, so they did not invalidate the notice. Subject to the corrections and the four-month compliance period, the appeal was dismissed and the enforcement notice upheld.
That outcome is worth separating from cases where a notice alleges the wrong development or is so uncertain that correction would cause injustice. Planning Geek’s guide to enforcement notices and appeals covers the statutory grounds and the importance of reading the allegation, requirements and compliance period as distinct parts of the notice.
What practitioners should take from the decision
The strongest point from the Tower Hamlets enforcement appeal is evidential. If the precise character of a use matters, the evidence should describe what was actually happening at the premises at the relevant date, not merely what the business calls itself or how it operates now.
The appeal was decided by Inspector Robin Buchanan on 30th September 2026 after a site visit on 24th September. The full Tower Hamlets enforcement appeal decision is available to read on Planning Geek. The findings on use and evidence are in paragraphs 4 to 10, with the compliance period addressed in paragraphs 11 to 17.
Relevant legislation includes section 55, section 57, section 173A and section 174 of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990, together with article 3 and Schedule 2, Class E of the Use Classes Order 1987.
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