She today (5 December) ruled that the retailer could press ahead with its plan to replace the iconic building with a 10-storey office scheme by Pilbrow & Partners.Rayners Tory predecessor, Michael Gove, blocked M&Ss plans to demolish its flagship Oxford Street store in July 2023, but his decision was quashed by a High Court judge in March 2024.The court ruling meant the case had to be returned to the secretary of state to be redetermined. With the change of government this summer, the final decision fell to Rayner.AdvertisementCelebrities including Bill Bryson, Kevin McCloud, George Clarke and Griff Rhys Jones signed an open letter to the communities secretary this summer demanding that M&S Oxford Street be saved from demolition.The writers, broadcasters and comedians joined architects including Native Studio founder Sanaa Shaikh, London Eye designer Julia Barfield and Sarah Wigglesworth to urge Rayner to save the building.In their letter, the pro-retention campaigners described the retailers proposal as a smash-and-grab.The last government made clear it would act on the significant embodied carbon emissions associated with demolition followed by replacement building, they wrote.For a Labour government elected partly on its commitment to climate action and creating a zero-waste economy to fall short of this perhaps under the misapprehension that such an approach is anti-development would be a tragedy.AdvertisementThe letter said that the re:store design competition run by AJ and SAVE Britains Heritage (SAVE) highlighted progressive options for the M&S buildings re-use and adaption, demonstrating that by no means does this groundswell of opposition equal nimbyism.Other signatories to the letter include, the AJ's managing editor Will Hurst, SAVE director Henrietta Billings, Mikhail Riches co-founder Annalie Riches, HTA chair and former RIBA president Ben Derbyshire, Bennetts founder Rab Bennetts, Henley Halebrown principal Simon Henley and head of the London School of Architecture Neal Shasore.M&Ss proposal for its flagship 1920s store near Marble Arch would see three buildings on the prominent corner site next to Selfridges demolished and replaced with a 10-storey new store and office block.Because of the up-front carbon cost of new construction, the plan would release almost 40,000 tonnes of embodied carbon.The carbon impact of the proposal was highlighted by Gove among his reasons for refusal last year, along with heritage and design concerns.However, the decision was overturned by the High Court on 1 March, following an M&S appeal on procedural grounds, which meant the retailer had to prove to the High Court that Gove had made an error in his decision-making. In her judgement, Mrs Justice Lieven ruled that M&S had succeeded in five out of six grounds for appeal.Having reappraised the plans and the planning inspector's report, Rayner has now approved the application. In terms of the loss of buildings and the impact to the surrounding historic environment, she claimed the 'benefits of the proposal outweigh the harm to the significance of the designated heritage assets'.She acknowledged that the scheme's embodied carbon and the fact that the required demolition would, in part, fail to 'support the transition to a low carbon future' weighed against the proposal, as per paragraph 157 (formerly paragraph 152) of the NPPF.However Rayner argued that those issues had to be set against the 'advantages of concentrating development in such a highly accessible location', the employment and regeneration benefits, and the 'potential harm to the vitality and viability' to London's West End which could follow from a refusal of permission.Responding to Rayners decision, M&S chief executive Stuart Machin said: I am delighted that, after three unnecessary years of delays, obfuscation and political posturing at its worst under the previous government, our plans for Marble Arch the only retail-led regeneration proposal on Oxford Street have finally been approved.We can now get on with the job of helping to rejuvenate the UKs premier shopping street through a flagship M&S store and office space, which will support 2,000 jobs and act as a global standard-bearer for sustainability.He added: We share the governments ambition to breathe the life back into our cities and towns and are pleased to see they are serious about getting Britain building and growing. We will now move as fast as we can.Pilbrow & Partners' founder Fred Pilbrow described the decision as 'long overdue' and echoed Machins words. tellnig the AJ: 'We can now get on with the job of helping to rejuvenate the UKs premier shopping street through a flagship M&S store and office space, which will support 2,000 jobs and act as a global standard-bearer for sustainability.'However Henrietta Billings, director SAVE Britain's Heritage, described the decision as a 'missed opportunity'.She said: 'The government has chosen the easy option business as usual - when it had a real chance to show leadership and ambition on this urgent issue. Our old, wasteful knock-it-down-and-start-again model is broken. There is real appetite in the construction sector for change. Theyre crying out for clarity from government.'Our old, wasteful knock-it-down-and-start-again model is brokenShe added: 'Reusing buildings is great for the planet, great for communities and its also great for growth. Just look at the cultural powerhouse that is Tate Modern, or converted department stores across the country, or the great Pennine textile mills that are once again a driving force in their local economies as commercial space or homes.'It is wilfully myopic not to see that the elegant M&S building could play a similar role in the story of Oxford Street, whose fortunes are already on the up.'More to follow.