Wychavon DC v EM is a double decision, so to speak, by Judge Mark on a housing benefit matter, with broader implications regarding incapacity. In essence, EM is profoundly disabled (mentally and physically). Her parents moved her from a care home, with the support of Worcestershire CC (which also encouraged the understanding that entitlement to HB would follow), to an annex they constructed at their home. EM had previously lived in the garage at their home, but this was unsuitable as EM required round the clock care from three carers, who needed their own accommodation. EM’s parents could not afford this new arrangement without housing benefit. EM’s dad entered into … Read the full post
Archive for the 'Benefits' Category
Secretary of State for Work and Pensions v Payne & Cooper (test case) [2011] UKSC 60
This is a decision of the Supreme Court. It considers the issue of whether deductions in respect of Social Fund Loan repayments and overpaid benefits can continue to be made after the making of a DRO during the moratorium period of 1 year after which time the debt will be written off. It also tidies up the existing law and introduces coherence which both parties sought.
Mrs. Payne had received a Social Fund loan of £843 in September 2007. In August 2009 she obtained a DRO listing the SF loan as a qualifying loan. … Read the full post
The Chartered Institute of Housing and the Guardian have put together the results of a survey into the effect of the housing benefit/LHA limits and the pegging to the bottom third of market rents coming into force in January. Specifically the survey looks at how many private properties in each area will cease to be affordable through housing benefit, how many housing benefit claimants there are in each area and, where available, how many properties remain affordable.
The headline is that just shy of 800,000 properties nationally (including Scotland) will cease to be affordable, though there is considerable variation across areas and even across London boroughs. There is a projected … Read the full post
Just when I thought we weren’t going to have a seasonal story this year. Westminster Council have ridden to the rescue.
A new proposal, announced by the eminently sane and reasonable Councillor Phillipa Roe, is that from April 2013, Westminster are to maintain a naughty and nice list and to use it for awarding or withholding Council Tax Benefit.
we believe that potentially linking council tax benefit to certain levels of behaviour is a sensible and fair way forward that rewards those that play an active part in their community whilst cracking down on those that misbehave or break the law
Yes, they’ll know if you’ve been bad or … Read the full post
Three decisions of the Administrative Appeals Chamber of the Upper Tribunal on HB matters stand out: SS v North East Lincolnshire Council (HB) [2011] UKUT 300 (AAC); MB v Royal Borough of Kensington & Chelsea (HB) [2011] UKUT 321 (AAC); MR v Bournemouth Borough Council (HB) [2011] UKUT 284 (AAC). If anything binds them together, it is the failure of the first tier tribunal to get to grips with a case, the problems caused by non-attendance of the Claimant or the attendance of the unrepresented Claimant, and the ability of the Upper Tribunal (by contrast) to nail the issues.
In SS, the issue arose because the first tier tribunal … Read the full post
Secretary of State for Work and Pension v Neera Mohammad [2011] EWCA Civ 1358 [not available on Bailii yet]
This is a case which turns very much on its facts and as far as the Income Support claimant is concerned, turned out badly.
Mrs. M. was the divorced wife left in occupation of the matrimonial home. Her husband had first acquired the home without a mortgage for the sum of £69,950 in 1987. 15 years later he took out a borrowing charged on the property in the sum of £114,000. In the ancillary relief proceedings in 2007, Mrs M agreed to indemnify her husband against this borrowing for the transfer … Read the full post
The Coalition’s proposed legislation this week has a marvellously retro feel to it. Sniff the air. Through the whiff of horse dung and open sewers, you can tell we are back in the days of Queen Anne and not solely because the lawfulness of the catholicity of a Monarch’s spouse was an issue deemed worth revisiting.
The Observer noted that a debate in the Lords on the Welfare Reform Bill gave rise to the prospect of the return of the window tax. The glorious proposals to cut the benefits of under-occupiers, so that they have to find a less commodious garrett, gives rise to the question of what constitutes a … Read the full post
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