[Edit 30 June 08. The judgment in the following case is now out. For a detailed comment, see this post.]
According to Inside Housing, London & Quadrant are fighting an application for Judicial Review in Susan Weaver v London & Quadrant Housing Trust. It appears that the applicant is making the full-on challenge – that Housing Associations are public bodies – as a defence to a ground 8 possession.
This will be very interesting. Clearly, housing associations can be capable of being public bodies where fulfilling the function of a public body. But the circumstances in which that might be said to be the case have been highly arguable, and in any case appeared to be quite severely limited by the implications of the care home decision in YL v Birmingham in the House of Lords. What isn’t clear from the Inside Housing note is the circumstances in this case. Is it transferred local authority housing stock, for example?
I would have thought that YL v Birmingham would have put a strict limit on any attempt to have housing associations be taken as public bodies tout court, so more details would be good.
Needless to say, L&Q are apparently aiming to fight this tooth and claw. As one of the largest housing associations to use ground 8 in possession claims frequently, I’m not surprised that they are. The reasons for bringing ground 8 possession claims would all too often be susceptible to judicial review.
Much more, of course, when this one reaches a public result.
Inside Housing’s news feed is currently broken on my feeds page and the feed fails to validate, all because of the Q in L&Q. I smell a conspiracy…