The re-design of the administration of housing benefit has sought to address the scheme’s complexity in recent years – the local housing allowance is a particular example of this re-design, with the shift to flat rate payments according to household size. Complexity has been constructed as bad for claimants, who are (or were) unaware of their maximum entitlement, and bad for the administration, which needs to be made more efficient. All of this re-design can be subsumed within the rubric of “from discretion to rules” – discretion now being a “bad”, rules being a “good”, a remarkable turnaround from the position in the 1970s but there we go. Rules create … Read the full post
Tag Archive for 'disability discrimination'
Beedles v Guiness Northern Counties Limited (2010) High Court (Manchester) (QB) HQ10X02893 [Not on Bailii yet].
This is an intriguing case sent to us on the nature and extent of the duty to provide an auxiliary aid or service under S.24C Disability Discrimination Act 1995 (involving a point which will still be relevant for the Equality Act 2010). There will be more to come, as Mr Beedles has been given permission to appeal, on grounds we’ll come back to below.
Mr B was the assured tenant of GNC. Mr B suffers from grand mal epilepsy, with frequent seizures, up to a few per day despite being on anti-convulsant medication. He … Read the full post
Pieretti v London Borough of Enfield [2010] EWCA Civ 1104
This is an odd case, in lots of ways, but what is decided in this appeal to the Court of Appeal is potentially of broader significance and certainly useful as clarification. The issue was whether, and if so to what extent, the duty on local authorities under (1) of s.49A of the Disability Discrimination Act 1995 applies to exercise of powers and discharge of duty under Part VII of Housing Act 1996 – the homelessness provisions.
S.49A is to be replaced, at a date not yet set, by wider and perhaps stronger provisions in s.149 of the Equality Act 2010, … Read the full post
Thomas-Ashley v Drum Housing Association Ltd [2010] EWCA Civ 265
This is probably the biggest single week for dog-related possession claims ever. At this rate, the RSPCA will have to open a housing practice.
The brief facts are at para 1 of the Court of Appeal judgment:
Alfie is a Jack Russell/Border Collie cross. He lives with the appellant in her one bedroom flat at 1, Itchen Court, Crombie Close, Lovedean in Hampshire. Unfortunately the appellant’s tenancy agreement does not allow dogs to be kept on the premises. The respondents’, Drum Housing Association Ltd. her landlords, told her Alfie would have to leave. When he did not they took proceedings
Boyejo & Ors, R (on the application of) v Barnet London Borough Council [2009] EWHC 3261 (Admin)
This was the conjoined hearing of an application for Judicial Review of both Barnet and Portsmouth Councils, both JRs bought by Yvonne Hossack and here represented by Stephen Knafler. It makes a distinct contrast and counterpoint to R (Garbet) v Circle 33 Housing Trust and another [2009] EWHC 3153 (Admin) [our note here]. It also makes important findings for anyone dealing with local authority policy or service provision decisions affecting people with disabilities. Apologies for the lengthy note, but detail is unavoidable…
Again, the issue was the withdrawal of resident warden … Read the full post
From Usefully Employed (hat-tip) comes the news that the consultation on the Equality Bill proposes the introduction of indirect discrimination as a category, which would help with the horlicks that the Lords made of the 1995 Act in Malcolm v Lewisham:
[the Bill shall] adopt the concept of indirect discrimination for the purposes of the disability discrimination provisions in the Equality Bill, rather than carry forward to the Equality Bill the existing provisions in the Disability Discrimination Act 1995 that apply to disability-related discrimination. Once a prima facie case of indirect discrimination has been made, it will be possible for the person who imposed the provision, criterion or practice
Table of contents for Disability Discrimination
- Catching up – Disability Discrimination and possession
- Disability and tenancy – More on Malcolm
- On impotent landlords and disability.
- Disability discrimination – the comparator
- DDA and mandatory possession
- S v Floyd and a disability defence
- Adjourning pending Malcolm in the Lords
- And now Malcolm!
- Malcolm in brief
- Comments on Malcolm in the Lords
Oh dear, oh dear. That could have gone better.
I’m not going to go into great detail on the five separate judgments from the House of Lords in LB Lewisham v Malcolm [2008] UKHL 43, but I do want to look at where it leaves us and what the problems are … Read the full post
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