Court revokes Pieta development permit after appeal by cultural heritage watchdog

The Court of Appeal has revoked a planning permit for a residential and office block in Pieta, ruling on Friday that the Environment and Planning Review Tribunal acted beyond its powers when it ordered revised plans while deciding the case.

The judgment, delivered by Judge Mark Simiana in the lower appellate jurisdiction, concerned two separate appeals arising from a tribunal decision of 22 May 2025 on Planning Appeal 41/2025 MS.

The appeals were filed by Ciantar Properties Limited, the permit applicant, and by the Superintendence of Cultural Heritage, which had opposed the development.

The case centred on permit PA/6740/23, approved earlier this year, for a seven-level facade block with underground parking, a ground-floor Class 4A office, six apartments and a receded penthouse at 101, Triq ix-Xatt, Pieta.

The site, previously cleared under a 2017 permit, lies within a sensitive urban landscape overlooking several Grade 1 and Grade 2 scheduled properties, including St Luke’s Hospital, Villa Frere and Villa Cal Rose.

The superintendence had objected to the scale of the proposed block, warning that its height and massing would dominate the streetscape, obstruct strategic views, and compound the visual impact of an adjacent eight-storey building approved in 2016.

In May, the tribunal partially upheld the superintendence’s appeal. It found that although the local plan allows a maximum height of five floors and a semi-basement, this did not grant an automatic entitlement to build to the limit.

The tribunal also held that the proposed depth and volume would further intensify development in a sensitive area. It annulled the permit notification and ordered the applicant to submit revised drawings within 30 days, including a two-floor reduction and limits on development depth from second-floor level upwards.

Ciantar Properties appealed, arguing that the tribunal had imposed height and massing criteria not found in planning policies and had wrongly applied policies G2 and G21 of the Development Control Design Policy (DC15).

The court rejected both grievances. The judge confirmed that the maximum height is a ceiling, not a mandatory threshold, and that the tribunal was entitled to consider visual impact and contextual contribution under the cited policies. These findings, the court said, were factual assessments properly within the tribunal’s remit.

The superintendence also appealed, claiming that the tribunal should have revoked the permit outright and that it had breached Article 31 of the Development Planning Act by ordering new plans at the same moment it decided the case. The court dismissed the first grievance, noting that the superintendence had identified no specific legal error on the reduction ordered. However, it upheld the grievance on procedure.

The judge held that Article 31 allows the tribunal to call for new documents or plans only before deciding an appeal, not concurrently with its decision. By demanding revised drawings while giving judgment, the tribunal deprived parties of the opportunity to make submissions on a materially altered proposal.

The scale of the changes, two fewer floors and reduced depth, meant that the “merit of the issue” had shifted. In such circumstances, the tribunal was required to revoke the permit and return the matter to the Planning Authority for re-assessment through the ordinary process.

Because the tribunal had not followed this procedure, the court set aside the part of its decision ordering revisions and revoked the permit.

The court therefore dismissed the developer’s appeal, upheld the superintendence’s procedural complaint, and confirmed that the case must return to the Planning Authority should the applicant choose to pursue a fresh proposal.