Development Intent
AtlasHarrowOfficersLuke Mcbratney
Case officer · Harrow Planning

Luke McBratney.

Last recorded decision Jun 2024 — no decisions in this record since

A case officer at Harrow with an approval rate of 56% across 128 decided planning applications, spanning 12 wards.[1] Decision speed and appeal performance publish when decision notices are ingested.

Planning officer128 decisions56% approvalSave
Harrow · ward map
Approval rate — by ward
Lower ~68%
Higher ~90%
ShowingAll years · subscriber →across all years on record — a period re-scopes the headline figures and the trend
At a glanceEach metric links to the investigation behind it
All investigations →
128
Applications
2022–24
Approval rate over time — tougher or softer 🔒Dashed line = London average
avg 81%57%202356%2024
Approval-rate trend is subscriber dataSubscribe to see the trend →
What they decide — by application type
How they compareVersus peers
Approval rate56% · 60th of 72
higher is betterdashed = London avg
Decision time · publishes with decision notices
in development
Appeal overturn · publishes with decision notices
in development
How this officer decides — from their own reports63 officer reports parsed
0%
Approves despite concerns
of approvals record a documented reservation
0%
Negotiated approvals
approvals mentioning revisions/amendments
14%
"On balance" reports
reports using explicit balancing language
63%
Bespoke reasoning
of report text written for the case, not recited
What they write about — vs Harrow's average officer

Topic mentions per 1,000 words of their own report text (boilerplate stripped), indexed against all parsed Harrow reports. Attention, not stance.

Noise & disturbance
1.93× borough avg
Daylight & sunlight
1.82× borough avg
Outlook & amenity
1.6× borough avg
Transport & parking
1.57× borough avg
Flooding & drainage
1.18× borough avg

Mark = borough average (1×). Bar capped at 2×.

How they reason — coded from their reports

McBratney's reports lean into the borough's checklist pro-forma with an explicit YES/NO answer against every numbered criterion, but distinctively adds a short justification sentence directly after each 'Is the proposal acceptable?' line rather than deferring justification to a separate paragraph. His HMO/flat-conversion refusals work through Policy H8 (loss of housing) as a first-principles test before any design assessment.

Observable habits

· answers 'Is the proposal acceptable?' immediately after each individual checklist criterion with its own short justification sentence, rather than one combined justification at the end

· on nursery/community-facility use changes, tests compliance with Policy H8 (loss of existing housing) as the FIRST test before any design or amenity assessment

· assesses vertical stacking and noise transference between flats as its own distinct sub-topic separate from general residential amenity

What their reports consistently look for

· what this officer's reports consistently look for: whether Policy H8's loss-of-housing test is satisfied FIRST, before any design or amenity assessment of a change of use

· what this officer's reports consistently look for: a specific justification sentence attached to each individual checklist criterion, not a single combined paragraph

· what this officer's reports consistently look for: whether noise transference mitigation measures have been demonstrated between vertically stacked flats

Assigned Luke McBratney on a live case?What they pay attention to, how they reason, and what their reports consistently look for — so you can address it before they raise it.Subscribe to unlock →
In their own words

the existing change of use of the ground and part first floor to a nursery fails to comply with Policy H8 of the London Plan in this regard. This is afforded substantial weight

PL/0171/23

the applicant has failed to demonstrate mitigation measures to reduce the noise transference between the living accomodation of flat B

PL/0335/23

Measured from 63 published Harrow officer reports written by this officer, with recited policy boilerplate stripped before any counting. These describe how this officer works and writes — they are not outcome predictions. Every quote is from a named public report.

Policy playbook — what this officer cites[3]

The policies this officer cites most in their own reports — times cited across 63 parsed reports. Whether refusals citing each survive appeal isn't traced per policy yet.

D1
1 times cited
D3
1 times cited
CS1.B
1 times cited
DM1Achieving a High Standard of Development
1 times cited
DM10On Site Water Management and Surface Water Attenuation
1 times cited
Which policies this officer leans on is subscriber intelligenceSubscribe to unlock →
Decisions by ward

Where this officer's caseload concentrates, 2022–24.[1] Click the map above to focus this page on a ward, or a row to open the ward.

Recent applications
Address
Reference
Type
Outcome
Date
P/1862/23
Full Planning Application
Approved
2024-08-01
P/1862/23
Full Planning Application
Approved
2024-08-01
Full application history locked
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Consultants approved most— subscriber data
1. Linear Insight Ltd
2. Smart Planning Designs Ltd
3. KDB Building Designs Ltd
4. Addoil Ltd
At a glance
OfficerLuke McBratney
BoroughHarrow
RolePlanning officer
Experience
Applications128 (2022–24)
Approval rate56%
London approval avg81%
Who decides here
GovernmentMayor of LondonCouncilCommitteeOfficersDecisionsApplicantsInspectorate
Related investigations
When committees overrule officers like this one →
How often members depart from officer recommendations, and how those overrides fare at appeal.
How much gets decided without a committee →
The delegated share by borough and officer — where the real power over decisions sits.
Sources & method
  1. [1]Applications decided, approval rate, per-year trend and ward breakdown — London Borough of Harrow planning register and published decision notices, 2022–24. · methodology
  2. [2]Appeal overturn and decision-time benchmarks — Planning Inspectorate (PINS) appeal decisions and application date pairs; not yet computed per officer, shown as a dash until they are. · PINS appeals casework
  3. [3]Condition load — mean effective conditions attached to Harrow decision notices (grant/split), parsed from the published notice text; a borough figure, not yet split per case officer.
  4. [4]"How this officer decides", the policy playbook and all quotes — parsed from 63 published Harrow officer reports written by this officer, recited policy boilerplate stripped before counting; disposition text coded from their own reasoning with every quote machine-verified verbatim. Descriptive of how they work — not outcome predictions.
Methodology is published in full so every number is traceable to its primary source.