Tag Archives: eviction

Proportionality and stay of eviction

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One of the questions posed as a result of Hounslow LBC v Powell [2011] UKSC 8 [our report here] is what happens if a proportionality argument is raised after a possession order has been made, but before eviction.

Powell found that s.89 Housing Act 1980, which limits the time for a stay of possession order to a maximum of 6 weeks, was compatible with Article 8. So, once a possession order has been made, does the court have any discretion to revisit or extend a period of stay beyond 6 weeks?

Ngesa v Crawley BC [2011] EWCA Civ 1291 [Not on Bailii yet] addresses this issue, though perhaps … Read the full post

When is a warrant executed?

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Royal Bank of Scotland v Bray Halifax County Court 25 November 2011

At what point in the course of an eviction and securing of a property is the warrant considered to be executed, so that no application for a stay can be made? This is a County Court case, but the Court’s decision is clear and supported.

Mrs Bray’s home was mortgaged to RBS. RBS had obtained a possession order and had obtained, then withdrawn 5 previous warrants. RBS got a further warrant. Before the eviction date Mrs B wrote to RBS offering to clear the arrears at lunchtime on 18 November 2011 as she had sold her car and … Read the full post

That’s not the way to do it

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Zolotareva v Russia (App. No. 15003/04)

With a hat-tip to the Garden Court bulletin, here is a decision of the European Court of Human Rights on the enforcement of an eviction. Ms Zolotareva lived in a municipally owned flat with her son, ex-daughter-in-law and grandchild. She thought that could no longer all live together (I refer you to the “ex” in the last sentence and possibly also the “in-law”) and commenced proceedings for the eviction of her son’s ex-wife. She in turn counter-claimed, asking the court to order that they all get rehoused elsewhere.

The court sided with the ex-wife and ordered not only that she and her … Read the full post

On the naughty step: Bait and Switch

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I don’t read the Daily Telegraph. Frankly I’ve failed to see the point since it stopped featuring details of the salacious trial of the day as a regular fixture on page 3, because the rest of it was preposterous blimpish nonsense, mainly full of regret that Britain ever came off the gold standard. I was dimly aware that it had a re-design some years ago and was trying to be hip, which is like Tunbridge Wells re-branding itself as Barcelona, or the journalistic equivalent of dad-dancing.

Still, it is a broadsheet newspaper, with small print, a serif typeface and the occasional long word, so it has pretensions to being … Read the full post

Tis the season for giving (1)

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Leeds and Yorkshire Housing Association v Vertigan, Court of Appeal, December 9, 2010 (Elias LJ, Norris J, Lawtel note only)

Vertigan was the assured shorthold tenant of the claimant. Over the years, it seems that he had done a number of things of which his landlord disapproved, including: (a) sawing through the floorboards to access a cellar, which was not demised to him; (b) damaging padlocks placed by the landlord to exclude him from certain areas; (c) erecting a metal structure outside his flat that he refused to remove; and, (d) allowing his dogs to foul the communal areas.

The landlord issued possession proceedings and the judge granted an … Read the full post

Re-entry and re-opening: updates from Legal Action

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June’s Legal Action housing updates have a bumper collection of interesting county court cases, as you’ll already know. For our archives, this is the first of a couple of posts. This one deals with cases on post-eviction re-entry and on re-opening possession proceedings, including an LB Croydon case that very nearly merited a naughty step post of its own.

Croydon LBC v Mensah-Bonsu, Croydon County Court 15/03/2010
Ms Mensah-Bonsu was Croydon’s secure tenant. In August 2009 a suspended possession order was made on terms of rent plaus £21.60 per month. Ms M-B complied until December 2009, when she missed a payment due to ill health. She contacted Croydon offering … Read the full post

The Basildon Endgame

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As people may well have noticed from the news on TV and in the press, the last Court of Appeal hearing in the drawn out saga of the (unlawful) Essex traveller sites resulted in a defeat for the travellers. Basildon District Council v McCarthy & Ors [2009] EWCA Civ 13 was the Court of Appeal hearing of Basildon DC’s appeal against a High Court decision that, in effect, evictions could not proceed against individual households until individual consideration of their circumstances had been carried out. Some 63 caravan pitches were at issue.

Previous litigation over planning permission had been exhausted and, for the occupants, it was admitted that they occupied … Read the full post