Ligi Ippjanar

In a case concerning the long-running dispute over the legality and continued operation of the Każin Santa Marija tal-Mosta fireworks manufacturing facility, the First Hall sitting in its Constitutional jurisdiction was asked to examine what happens when a party wins a final appeal and the State later changes the law in a way that weakens […]

Legal arguments are not written only because something is imminent. They are often written to correct misthinking and to set the record straight. They may be advanced to alert, to provoke counter-argument, or precisely because they may be partially—or even intrinsically—mistaken. That is how serious scholarship evolves. Legal writing in the public sphere is therefore […]

In developments that rely on the Floor Area Ratio framework, “public open space” is not protected merely as a numerical remainder, but as a planned urban asset with a defined purpose. The Planning Policy Guide on the Use and Applicability of the Floor Area Ratio (FAR) (2014) requires that tall or medium-rise schemes create high-quality […]

In Urban Conservation Areas, planning law is often tested not by large-scale redevelopment but by modest interventions that affect the roofscape. A party wall raised at roof level may appear, at first sight, to be a private adjustment between neighbours. Yet once that wall becomes visible from the public realm, it ceases to be a […]

One issue which is worth recalling in the context of development control enforcement concerns the legal consequences of silence within a planning permission. This difficulty frequently arises in developments where the permission authorises a particular form of works and imposes a general obligation to comply with approved drawings and applicable policy, yet deliberately or inadvertently […]

Residential redevelopment is sometimes advanced on the assumption that an existing opening onto a narrow passage is sufficient to justify additional height, more units, and greater intensity. Planning law takes a more structured approach. It requires, first, that residential units front onto a space that is recognised in planning terms, and second, that the environment […]