[2006] EWCA Civ 12, 19 January 2006. Considers whether a planning permission needed to be extant when the secretary of state sought to bring into operation a Compulsory Purchase Order (CPO) facilitating the construction of a by-pass. N appealed against the earlier decision ([2005] EWHC 890 (Admin), unreported) that the SoS has lawfully made operative a 1997 CPO facilitating the construction of the by-pass. N contended that the SoS bound himself in the light of the issue's history and by his letter not to make the CPO operative without satisfying himself that the planning permission was still extant and that the permission must be extant to allow the CPO to be made operative. The permission was also not extant at the time of SoS's decision to make the CPO operative. "Held": appeal dismissed. SoS could rationally proceed to make the CPO operative without being satisfied that the by-pass would be constructed following the by-pass permission. The status of the planning permission was irrelevant to SoS's decision to make the order operative. There was no violation of the principle that unlawful operations could not amount to of the commencement of a development.