Unauthorised encampments: what the council can do

Unauthorised encampments are where people live in caravans or vehicles on land they do not own and have no permission to be on. It might be a grass verge, a car park, a field or a piece of waste ground. Unauthorised encampments are one of the situations people most often ask a council to act on, and they are also one of the most misunderstood.

Two completely separate things can be going on at once, and it helps to keep them apart. One is the question of whether the people can be moved off the land, which is mostly about trespass and public order. The other is whether the land is being used for something it does not have planning permission for, which is where a council’s planning department comes in.

This page explains both, who deals with what, how quickly anything actually happens, and what your options are, whether you are a neighbour who wants it dealt with or the person being asked to move.

Moving people off the land

Getting people and their vehicles off the land is usually the first thing everyone wants, and it is not a planning matter at all. It is dealt with by the landowner, the council as landowner, or the police, depending on whose land it is and what is happening there.

If the encampment is on private land, the owner can ask the people to leave and, if they will not, can go to the county court for a possession order. If it is on council land, the council can use a power in the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994 to give a written direction to leave. If the people stay after that, the council can ask the magistrates’ court for an order to remove them, and it can then enter the land and move the vehicles, though it has to give at least 24 hours’ notice first if the land is occupied. Failing to obey a direction to leave, or coming back within three months, is itself an offence.

The police have their own, wider powers. Since June 2022 there has been a criminal offence of living on land in or with a vehicle without permission where significant damage, disruption or distress has been caused or is likely. Someone convicted can be fined and can even have their vehicle seized. The police can also direct a group to leave in certain cases. The prohibited return period is now three months: section 168 of the Crime and Policing Act 2026 reduced it from twelve months with effect from 29 June 2026.

None of these powers is automatic. Before a council moves anyone, it has to make welfare enquiries, taking account of things like a pregnant woman close to her due date, a young child, illness or a death in the family, and it has to act fairly and proportionately. That is not a loophole; it is the law, and it is one of the main reasons removal can feel slow.

What the council can do about unauthorised encampments as a planning matter

The planning side is different, and it is slower, but it matters where people settle in and stay. Stationing caravans on land so that people live there, or turning a field into a place vehicles are kept, can be a change in the use of the land. A material change of use needs planning permission, and doing it without permission is a breach of planning control.

Where that has happened, the planning department can treat it like any other unauthorised development. It can investigate, and where it decides action is worthwhile it can serve an enforcement notice requiring the use to stop and the land to be put back. It first has to judge that acting is expedient, weighing the harm against the development plan and everything else that is relevant, so a council will not always enforce, especially where the stay is short.

Because an enforcement notice carries a compliance period and can be appealed, it is not a quick way to clear a field. Where speed is needed the council can add a temporary stop notice, which can require an activity to stop almost at once, or in a serious case it can go to the High Court for an injunction. Our pages on temporary stop notices and the planning injunction explain how those work.

Is it always a planning breach

Not always, and this is where people get caught out. A short stop by people passing through may not be a material change of use at all, because planning is concerned with the settled use of land rather than a few nights. There are also permitted rights that let land be used for camping or caravans for a limited number of days a year without a separate permission, which is why the calendar matters.

If you are a landowner wondering whether people staying on your own land needs permission, our guide to caravans and planning permission and the 28-day rule set out where the line falls. Putting caravans on your land and living in them, as opposed to occasional use, will usually need permission and can be enforced against if you do not have it.

Applying for permission after the event

Where someone wants to stay lawfully, the answer is to apply for planning permission for the use, and a site can be granted permission as a caravan or traveller site if it is acceptable in planning terms. There is no free pass because the caravans are already there. A retrospective application can also affect whether ground (a) is available on a later enforcement appeal: for an enforcement notice issued in England on or after 25 April 2024, ground (a) is unavailable where the enforcement notice was issued after the related retrospective application was made and within two years after that application ceased to be under consideration. The sequence and dates therefore need thought before an application is made.

There is a fee to apply, and it is worth being clear about the cost before you start rather than after. See our guide to planning fees for how the charge is worked out. Whether applying is the right move at all depends on how likely permission is, and on a difficult site the honest answer is sometimes that it is not.

If the council refuses, or serves a notice

If you apply and the council refuses, you can appeal to the Planning Inspectorate. See our guide to planning appeals for how that works and how long it takes.

If instead the council serves an enforcement notice, that carries its own right of appeal, on grounds that include arguing that permission should be granted. The deadline is strict and there is no fee to appeal an enforcement notice. Our pages on enforcement notices and how to appeal and the enforcement appeal grounds explain the choices. A direction to leave under the 1994 Act, by contrast, cannot be appealed in the same way; the only challenge is judicial review, which has a short deadline of its own.

A note on fairness and human rights

Whichever route is used, a council has to act proportionately and to take account of people’s circumstances, including their health, housing need and family life. That does not mean an encampment cannot be moved or a breach cannot be enforced against; planning control of how land is used is exactly the kind of thing the law allows. It does mean a bare “get them off” is not enough on its own, and a council that ignores the human side can find its decision unpicked. Our page on human rights and planning enforcement goes into this.

If you reported it and nothing seems to happen

It is common to report unauthorised encampments and feel that nothing is being done. Often something is being done that you cannot see, because welfare enquiries, notice periods and court dates all take time, and a planning enforcement case runs on a longer clock again. See how to report a breach of planning control for what a council can and cannot tell you, and where to take a complaint if you think it has failed to act properly.

Relevant legislation on unauthorised encampments

Links below go to legislation.gov.uk. Always check the “Changes to Legislation” panel at the top of each provision, because amendments are often listed there before they are written into the text.

• Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994, section 77, a local authority’s power to direct people living in vehicles to leave land
• Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994, section 78, the magistrates’ court removal order and entry onto the land
• Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act 2022, Part 4, the 2022 offence of residing on land in or with a vehicle without consent, inserted as sections 60C to 60E of the 1994 Act
• Crime and Policing Act 2026, section 168, reducing the prohibited return period under the unauthorised encampment powers from twelve months to three months from 29 June 2026
• Town and Country Planning Act 1990, section 172, the power to serve an enforcement notice where it is expedient
• Town and Country Planning Act 1990, section 171E, temporary stop notices
• Town and Country Planning Act 1990, section 187B, the power to seek an injunction

Other Enforcement Sections

Unauthorised Encampments Page Updated: 22nd August 2026