If the planning department approve an application which we are against,is it possible to appeal the decision, and if so how. All I could find on the Internet is how to appeal if they turn an application down. Any advice would be appreciated. Thanks.
No, you cannot appeal against an approval of permission. The only right of appeal is by the original applicant in a case where the planning application is turned down.
horselady is quite correct unless there is an error of law by the local authority, whereas the developer has a statutory right of appeal to a Planning Inspector against refusal, the objector has no appeal. This means that the developer can appeal on the merits, whereas the objector cannot and hence has to find some error of law in the determination by the planning department capable of being judicially reviewed.
The only way a third party can appeal a planning application is if there were legal improprieties in its determination. You would go to the Ombudsman in the first instance, and then (if you can afford it) onto the High Court.
Planning permission was granted on land next door to me despite all objections to it, (the proposed access being only 7 1/2 foot wide and set back from the road next door to a shop), the work was started, we then went to the ombudsman who had the building work stopped. It was then taken by the owner of mthe site to the secretary of state who upheld the objections that had been made before planning was granted and had the whole site closed immediately.