Rectory Homes Ltd v Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government [2020] EWHC 2098 (Admin)
Rectory Homes extra care dwellings is an important Planning Court case on whether accommodation falling within Use Class C2 can nevertheless contain “dwellings” for the purposes of an affordable housing policy.
The answer was yes. The use-class label and the meaning of the word dwelling in a development-plan policy are not automatically the same thing.
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- Neutral citation
- [2020] EWHC 2098 (Admin)
- Court
- High Court, Queen's Bench Division, Planning Court
- Judgment date
- 31st July 2020
- Judge
- Mr Justice Holgate
- Case number
- CO/4682/2019
What Rectory Homes decided
The case concerned a proposed Housing with Care development at The Elms in Thame. The scheme comprised 78 self-contained extra-care units together with communal and care facilities. The parties agreed that the development as a whole fell within Use Class C2.
The local plan required 40% affordable housing on sites involving a net gain of three or more dwellings. Rectory Homes argued that because the development was C2 rather than C3, the individual units could not be dwellings for the purpose of that policy.
Mr Justice Holgate rejected that argument and dismissed the challenge.
A dwelling is not automatically the same thing as a C3 dwellinghouse
The judgment draws an important distinction between a planning use class and the ordinary planning meaning of a dwelling.
The Use Classes Order groups uses for particular statutory purposes. It does not provide a universal dictionary which fixes the meaning of every word used in every local plan.
A self-contained unit can therefore have the physical and functional characteristics of a dwelling even though the overall development, because of the level of care and communal services provided, falls within C2.
The policy wording and context come first
Whether a policy uses dwelling as shorthand for C3 depends on the wording and context of that particular policy. There was nothing in the South Oxfordshire policy which required that narrow interpretation.
The court was therefore entitled to treat the 78 units as dwellings for the affordable-housing policy while accepting that the overall use was C2.
This is particularly relevant to specialist housing, where the planning use may depend on the package of care, management and communal provision rather than simply the internal layout of each unit.
Why the case matters for affordable housing
Rectory Homes is a warning against assuming that an affordable-housing requirement disappears simply because a development has been described as C2.
The correct exercise is to interpret the relevant development-plan policy objectively. If the policy applies to dwellings in a broader planning sense, self-contained extra-care units may fall within it.
Planning Geek’s guide to affordable housing planning explains the wider policy framework.
Read the full Rectory Homes judgment
The full Planning Court judgment is held in the Planning Geek case law library. Gold Members can open the protected PDF below.
Rectory Homes Case Law Page Updated: 10th September 2026