Demolition Orders: What to Do and What Not To
A demolition order is not one thing. There is an administrative order, where an application to cancel it must be filed within three days, and a judicial order made in a court process. Which one you are holding determines what can be done and in what time. This guide sets out the difference, the order of steps, and what cannot be ignored.
The kinds of order
Planning and building enforcement runs on two parallel tracks, administrative and criminal, each with its own tools:
- An administrative demolition order. Made by an administrative authority without a prior criminal process. Designed to deal quickly with recent unlawful building.
- A judicial demolition order. Made by a court, usually within a criminal process or following one.
- An administrative or judicial stop order. Does not order demolition but the halting of works, and sometimes closure of the site.
Identifying which order you hold is the first step. It determines which forum to go to, what the deadline is, and what can be argued at all. An administrative order and a judicial order look similar on paper and proceed entirely differently.
The administrative order
The administrative order is the authority quick tool. It is made on the strength of a reasoned opinion and affidavit of an engineer, acting for the local planning committee or for the National Enforcement Unit, stating that the building was carried out without a permit or in excess of one, and it is signed by the officer empowered to make it. It is aimed at relatively recent building, so the Law sets threshold conditions concerning the stage of construction and how long the building has been occupied: an administrative demolition order cannot be made once six months have passed since construction was completed, and where the building is already occupied that period shortens to thirty days. Falling outside those conditions is a defect in the order itself.
Three practical points to grasp immediately:
- An application to cancel the order or to stay its execution must be filed within three days of the day the applicant learned of the order. It is filed in writing, on the form in the First Schedule to the Planning and Building Regulations (Rules of Procedure in Applications concerning an Administrative Demolition Order).
- Filing an application to cancel does not by itself stay execution. A separate express application for a stay must be filed alongside it, or demolition may be carried out while the file is pending.
- Do not rely on conversations or oral assurances from officials. What stays execution is a judicial decision, not a conversation.
The purpose of the order and how it is served. The order is meant to give the authorities a fast, effective tool against illegal construction while it is still fresh, which is why the courts confine their intervention to a narrow set of grounds. The order is affixed to the property together with the documents on which it was made, and the demolition can be carried out very shortly after it is posted, sometimes within a day. On the other hand, an order that is not executed within the period the law allows lapses and may no longer be carried out, so the deadlines binding the authority are worth checking too.
If you have received an administrative order, this is a matter that cannot wait. The scale is three days from the day you learned of the order, not weeks. How the days are counted, and how the application is filed, should be checked against the order itself and against the Regulations.
The judicial order
A judicial demolition order is made in a court process, usually after conviction of a building offence, and sometimes without conviction where the person who carried out the work cannot be identified. The timescales here are much longer, and the process allows evidence to be brought and the merits to be argued.
In the judicial process two main possibilities exist alongside the substantive defence:
- An application to postpone the date of execution, particularly where a planning process to regularise the building is under way with a real prospect of succeeding.
- An appeal against the decision, within the periods laid down by law.
Here too, the passing of the period is the main risk. An order not challenged in time becomes final, and from there the route is very narrow.
When is a judicial order made without a conviction? The Law lists defined situations: the person who carried out the prohibited work cannot be found with reasonable diligence, a summons cannot practicably be served on them, it cannot be proved who carried out the work, the person who carried it out has died or is not amenable to punishment, including because the offence is time-barred, or the prosecutor has decided that the circumstances do not warrant an investigation or prosecution. The order is executed by the National Enforcement Unit, the local planning committee or a local authority empowered to enforce.
Degrees of culpability in sentencing. Where demolition is sought as part of criminal sentencing, the courts examine the defendant’s degree of culpability. The case law (PlanBuild 47071-10-10 Shoham Local Planning Committee v. Zuckerman) sets out the parameters: the profit derived from the illegal building or non-conforming use, the length of time the illegal building stood, demolition or cessation of use at the defendant’s own initiative before sentencing, and breaches of judicial orders. It has further been held (CrimApp 4679/10 Shimshon v. Tel Aviv-Jaffa Municipality) that the profit includes the rise in the property’s value brought about by the building, and that the court may impose a fine of up to four times the value of the benefit, under section 63(a) of the Penal Law.
Stop work orders
A stop order does not require demolition but the halting of works at the site. It is made where building is being carried out without a permit or in departure from one, and it is intended to prevent the position worsening.
Breaching a stop order is an offence in itself, and sometimes a more serious one than the original. Continuing to work despite the order badly damages the defendant position later, even where there are good arguments on the merits.
The right step is to actually stop, document the state of the site at the moment of stopping, and only then act legally. Stopping is not an admission and does not weaken the arguments to be raised afterwards.
What can be argued
The arguments fall into two kinds, and the distinction matters:
- Administrative and procedural arguments. A defect in the making of the order, a missing affidavit or approval, misidentification of the structure, or acting beyond power. These are the strongest arguments in a challenge to an administrative order.
- Arguments on the building itself. That the work needed no permit, that it was done under an existing permit, or that the period in which an administrative order may be made has passed, that is six months from completion of construction or thirty days from the building being occupied.
The full administrative grounds. An administrative order is an administrative decision, and as such it can be attacked on the general grounds of review: lack of authority, illegality, unreasonableness, defects in the propriety of the administrative process, a factual foundation that was not properly laid before the decision-maker, and discretion that was not exercised or was exercised arbitrarily. Alongside these one can also argue the balance of harm: what injury the public interest would suffer if the property remained standing, against the damage the demolition would cause.
What does not stand on its own: it was built years ago, with no supporting material, or everyone builds like this. The first needs documentary proof, and the second is not a legal argument unless it is grounded in selective enforcement, which itself requires a real factual basis.
Regularising after the event
Alongside the legal process a second track sometimes runs: regularising the building by applying for a permit, usually with an application for relief or for non-conforming use. If regularisation is progressing, it is the basis for an application to postpone demolition.
Three points determine whether this route is realistic:
- Whether the building conforms to the applicable plan, and if not, how large the departure is. A small departure can usually be resolved. A change of designation is not relief.
- What the local committee position actually is, not only what is possible in theory.
- The timetable. A regularisation process runs for months. It helps only if it has been filed and started to move, not as an idea.
In practice, then, the two tracks run in parallel: the legal one, which buys time and protects the rights, and the planning one, which is the real solution where it is available.
In these proceedings the deadline counts no less than the argument. If a decision, order or demand has arrived, contact us at once with the document and the date on it. Call 02-5953322, send a WhatsApp message to 050-4411343 or leave your details in the form below, and we will get back to you as soon as possible.
What people ask most often
I have received an administrative demolition order. How long do I have?
Someone at the municipality told me the demolition will not be carried out. Is that enough?
What is the difference between an administrative and a judicial order?
Can the building be regularised after the event?
I have a stop work order. Can I carry on until the hearing?
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You have received a demolition or stop order
Send us the order and the date it was served, and photographs of the site if you have them. The deadlines on an administrative order are very short, so this is a matter for today rather than tomorrow.