In Re St Martin’s Church, Brampton [2025] ECC Car 11, the petitioners sought permission to appeal against the Chancellor’s judgment of 12 October 2025 which refused a faculty for external access works at the church. Permission was sought under rule 23 of the Faculty Jurisdiction Rules, (FJR), which required that the proposed appeal “[had] a real prospect of success or some other compelling reason for it to be heard”. FJR rule 22.2 states:

“Permission to appeal to a provincial court may be granted only where the judge to whom the application for permission to appeal is made considers that—
(a) the appeal would have a real prospect of success; or
(b) there is some other compelling reason why the appeal should be heard.”

Fryer-Spedding Ch stated that there is no practical difference between that test and the one prescribed by PART 52 – APPEALS – Civil Procedure Rules – Justice UK (“CPR”) in the context of civil litigation. An appeal may succeed if: a chancellor errs in law; errs in fact; or errs (to the appropriate extent) in the exercise of his or her discretion. The authority for these propositions lies in the decision in Re St Alkmund, Duffield [2013] Fam 158 (Arches Court of Canterbury) at paragraph 53, (reproduced here) [4]. As to the requirement that the appeal should have a “real prospect of success”, he took that to mean that there should be a realistic, as opposed to a fanciful, prospect of success (by analogy with the caselaw concerning CPR rule 52.6) [5].

The petitioners’ appeal referred to six plans drawn by Countryside Consultants Architects and Planners. These proposed three grounds of appeal: that the alternative access proposal identified in the judgment would result in inequality of access; would itself cause serious harm to the building’s significance [7]; and that the lack of equal access was rendering the church increasingly unfit for use [8].

The Chancellor observed that the grounds of appeal did not engage with the test for the grant of permission to appeal as set out in [3] to [5]. It was not contended, for example, that his evaluation of the facts taken as a whole was erroneous, or that he made an error of law, or that he erred (to the appropriate extent) in the exercise of a discretion.

Rather, on the strength of newly produced evidence, the Petitioners explained why they disagreed with the Chancellor’s decision. “That is different from making a case that [his] decision was wrong: which is the necessary exercise on an appeal [9]. Nor did the Petitioners say that there was some other compelling reason why the appeal should be heard. He stated:

“[11. These factors alone, in my view, form a sufficient basis for dismissing the application for permission to appeal”.

Nonetheless, for completeness, he made the further observations about the three proposed grounds of appeal ([13] to [19]), which “[s]o far as necessary…amount to additional reasons why permission to appeal is refused”.

The Chancellor explained that the judgment had expressly recognised the importance of equal access and had accepted the compelling need relied upon by the petitioners. The proposed grounds disclosed no realistic prospect of success and no other compelling reason to permit an appeal. Permission to appeal was therefore refused.