82.Section 52 inserts new sections 171E - 171H into the Town and Country Planning Act 1990. It provides local planning authorities with a new discretionary power to serve temporary stop notices to halt breaches of planning control for a period of up to 28 days. It gives them the means to prevent unauthorised development at an early stage without first having had to issue an enforcement notice. It allows them up to 28 days to decide whether further enforcement action is appropriate and what that action should be, without the breach intensifying by being allowed to continue.
83.The new sections set out how the notice must be issued, what the notice should say about the activities that should stop, and on whom the notice should be served. The temporary stop notice has effect immediately but ceases to have effect after 28 days, unless it is withdrawn earlier. It also sets out what the offences are for contravening a temporary stop notice and the arrangements for compensation.
84.There is also provision for the Secretary of State to prescribe in regulations other activities that a temporary stop notice shall not apply to, even though those activities are in breach of planning control. Regulations may set out these activities either by describing them or by setting out circumstances when an activity cannot be prohibited by a temporary stop notice. This section also sets out when second or subsequent temporary stop notices can be used.