as was the issue that if they accept your accommodation is ‘not reasonable to occupy’ (but ok as temporary accommodation)

Then you could not be intentionally homeless if you gave up (ie NTQ) accommodation that is not reasonable to occupy ….

All very surreal.

(urm and if JS was delivering the training then my comment is for the benefit of others ;) just occurred to me what JS possibly stands for)

One other point strikes me , if the local authority is to be assumed to remain under an immediate Section 193(2) duty – we will have the absurd situation of the authority making an ” offer of acccommodation ” of your own inadequate home ! – how can they said to be securing anything ?

So the occupant will need to make sure he or she ” accepts ” to avoid discharge under Section 193(5) before moving out and forcing the authority’s hand !

It is Alice in Wonderland .

By its very nature it is accepted that it is not reasonable to continue to occupy – hence if the occupier decides , I don’t care what the local authority thinks I can’t stay here a moment longer and moves out the authority will have a duty to secure that suitable accommodation is made available .

The occupier cannot be found to be intentionally homeless whether it is treated as Section 193(2) accommodation or simply as accommodation not so bad that the immediate duty is not triggered and therefore Section 191 nor 193(6)(b) can bite

So Baroness Hale has potentially revived the old homeless/intentionality divide from Puhlhofer days but in the context of discharge of duty rather than whether a duty is owed . The homeless at home cannot force the authority’s hand on the provision of suitable accommodation without difficulty or without making themselves roofless .

This is a very bad decision – unworkable in practice ( how will we know when the cannot stay one more night has been reached ? ) , writes indefinitely into Section 175(3) and ignores Section 175(4) .

Wouldn’t it just have been much easier to accept the reasoning behind Sidhu that neither Puhlhofer or Awua sought to disturb , that crisis accommodation is not accommodation within the meaning of the Act ?

Having read the Lords opinion but NOT the Court of Appeal judgement – yep that makes a difference.

I thought the phrase was specifically part of the Lords judgement. (even with it – I felt it was still wooly)

I had thought that the Court of Appeal judgement would result in Homeless at Home not being available to use for *clients* and had been concerned about that.

Cait

Maybe it’s a symptom of my having worked with homeless women for 14 years before doing legal help, that I actually was so relieved by the Moran decision that it coloured my view of the Birmingham implications and consequently I dont feel so doomladen as others.

In terms of the Birmingham decision, Im still trying to work it out … but, in a pragmatic way I didn’t think that was necessarily bad for the client (don’t all hit me please)

The problem with the Aweys decision from my view – was it appeared to me to stop the possibility of being ‘homeless at home’

As it’s often clients who want the preference, but dont want temp accom (who would!) I felt that stopping homelessness as home from being an option was a bad thing (and still do)

The Lords opinon seemed to have grasped this point – and emphasise the need for agreement not compulsion. Naive I may be, but they seemed to have a very good grasp of the conflicting issues.
And Birmingham can’t discriminate between homeless clients in the way they were doing.

Working nationally I don’t think *that* many councils *do* use homelessness at home – as that still effects their homeless stats but this clearly states they can’t be treated less favourably than someone in temporary accommodation.

I am aware of an Islington policy that differentiates between homeless applicants in temp accom and when they get notice on their temp accom ….

Sooo roll on lots of suitability cases, but I think there is still a lot in this judgement that is good (call me pollyanna)

But if the above info is correct about Mr Aweys, Mr Adam, and Ms Sharif then my point still stands, and Section 177(2) was relevant to their applications and Birmingham got themselves in the mess in the first place (with those cases).