[Edit 20/08/25 – anonymised at tenant’s request. NL]
Sanghera v O & O. Dartford County Court. 23 November 2023. (Unreported elsewhere. We were sent a copy of the judgment.)
This was a County Court appeal to a Circuit Judge of a possession order made by a Deputy District Judge. The issue on the appeal was whether the DDJ had correctly made a possession order based upon a section 21 notice given the issues raised by the tenant on the provision of the How to Rent guide.
The claim form N5B had stated that the then current version of the How to Rent guide had been provided to the tenants on 19 June 2019 – the start of the tenancy. A copy of the How to Rent guide with a certificate of service was attached to the claim form, saying that the Guide had been served by the landlord’s agent by hand on 19 June 2019. There was also the tenants’ signature on the last page of the tenancy acknowledging receipt of a number of documents, including one described as a How to Rent guide.
The problem for the Claimant landlord was the version of the guide that was attached to the claim form. This was dated, on page 2, as May 2019. But…
As long term readers may recall, there were a flurry of changes to the How to Rent guide between 31 May 2019 and 29 July 2019. The history is set out on our How to Rent Guide archive page, but in short
The How to Rent guide was amended on 31st May 2019 to include a reference to the Tenant Fees Act 2019, parts of which came into force on 1st June 2019.
The How to Rent guide was further amended on 3rd June 2019 to correct the name of one of the professional bodies which accredits letting agents.
The How to Rent guide was then altered again on 29th July 2019. The alteration was to page 4. The previous version which was current until then contained a final paragraph which ended by saying: “You can ask Shelter for help”. From 29th July 2019, that sentence in the How to Rent guide instead read: “You can ask Shelter for advice”.
The version of the guide attached to the claim form was the 29 July 2019 one. This could not possibly have been given on 19 June 2019.
In the initial claim, the landlord’s agent had made a witness statement which
referred to the acknowledgement receipt on the tenancy agreement and he said: “The defendants are put to very strict proof they didn’t receive a copy of the How to Rent guide as alleged, given that the evidence clearly suggests otherwise. For the avoidance of doubt, I also confirm that the How to Rent guide provided to the defendants was in fact the then current 2019 version”
But this did not clear up which of the four different 2019 versions was being referred to.
There was also an email from the agents to the tenants on 28 August 2019, attaching a copy of the 29 July 2019 guide and stating “Due to the tenants fee laws changing as of 1st June this year, please find attached a copy of the updated version of the How to Rent document”.
The problem for the Claimant landlord was therefore that there was no evidence that the then current version of the How to Rent guide had been given to the tenants. The version attached to the claim and attested to by a statement of truth was obviously not correct. The version provided by email didn’t count, as the Guide had to be provided in hard copy unless there was express agreement otherwise and nothing in the tenancy agreement allowed for service by email.
The agent’s
witness statement, in my view, is of no assistance to the claimant. The inaccuracy in the particulars of claim raises real concerns about the reliability of what is said by and on behalf of the claimant. Mr Stone does nothing to allay those concerns, but just makes a general assertion that was provided was the current version – indeed, by saying so he betrays a lack of understanding of whether there was more than one current version in 2019.
Then there is the email of August 2019. That is an interesting document. The stated reason why that email was sent is that the tenant fee law changed on 1st June. The sender of the email appears to have thought that the tenant had not received a copy of the How to Rent document which dealt with the new Tenant Fees Act, which came into force on that date. If that is right, it would mean that all the defendants had received would have been a version of How to Rent which preceded 31st May – because from 31st May the How to Rent guide did talk about the Tenant Fees Act. The email thus suggests that the sender, Ms Parkes of the claimant’s letting agents, considered the tenants had not received the then current version on 19th June 2019.
So the claimant had not established that the then current Guide was served on the tenant, on 19 June 2019 or subsequently. Possession order set aide and possession claim dismissed.
Comment
Oh dear, oh dear. As we said at the time:
Since 31 May 2019, there have been two ‘silent’ changes to the guide – hidden by MHCLG and still both billed as ‘v.4’. MHCLG really shouldn’t do this, given the significance of the document. The gov.uk page still says last updated 31 May 2019.
The current ‘How to rent’ guide pdf remains dated ‘May 2019’ at the bottom. This may well be a cause of confusion, for example for tenants thinking they have not received the latest version. Unfortunately, the only way to check is to look at the text on page 4 and 5 to see if it includes the two changes.
But MHCLG do not make archive copies of the How to Rent guide available. It is, to the best of my knowledge, only this site and, I gather, the NRLA, that archive copies and that is the only way to check the textual changes between versions, which is, of course, vital when MHCLG don’t actually change the date (!!!) on the changed documents, as happened in 2019.
But there we are, it is a statutorily prescribed document, which must be served before a section 21 notice. The simple answer to the position this landlord ended up in is to serve (not by email) a further copy of the most recent How to Rent guide prior to serving a section 21. There is no requirement for it to be given at the start of the tenancy (though it should have been) for a section 21 to be valid.
Of course, all of this may well become academic before too long, but it has not been an edifying saga.
In 2016, what was required for a S.21 possession order to be granted at an appeal where there had been no S.21 claim for possession made to the tenant? This is not a request for advice.
Well obviously it is a request for advice. It is also a comment that is completely irrelevant to the subject matter of the post. But the answer is that without detailed context, I’ve no idea how that could happen.
Not entirely related to the article, but relevant given some of the recent developments. We have noticed that some DJs are refusing possession orders sought by social landlords after the service of a section 21 notice, on the basis that the landlord cannot show that it has served the Right To Rent booklet. Despite Reg 3(5) making it clear that RPs are not required to do that.
We think that it might be as a result of someone relying on an AI-powered search result – one which doesn’t reflect the distinction between RPs and the private sector landlords.
I’d heard that. Possibly not AI, just a rushed DDJ with a possession list…
when Sasha Charles sent me a section 8 notice and it was printed on “landlord advice uk” letterhead with his own brand’s colour motif in the page numbers but otherwise textually verbatim lifted from… an outdated version of… the official DLUHC-published prescribed form, I challenged it in court, and he had instructed a CILEX advocate to counter this at the initial hearing, the advocate constantly spammed the DDJ’s ears with insistences that the mistake was from ambiguities in the government website “or wherever landlord advice uk had gotten the form letter from.” She seemed to then accept that this seemed to be the case, but the legal aid duty solicitor and Mr. Charles’s instructed advocate’s bickering was so fierce that I wasn’t actually even able to keep up with it at the time. The result was that the DDJ, reckoning that if it was the case that the official government form was simply misdated, then the notice would have been fine, while if it was that SC had forgotten to update his own custom-branded versions, then it would be “fatal,” contrary to the CILEX advocate’s insistence, to the possession claim. The crux, for me, was that the form didn’t just have superficial changes, but literally cited materially different provisions across the top so as to confound the very legal regime the grounds of which the claim was brought on. Specifically, it quoted schedule 2 of the Housing Act 1988 (as amended by… antisocial behaviour act xxx, X act yyy, Y act zzz, and… the Coronavirus Act 2020(!!)) My duty solicitor later told me that he thought, based on the reasonable recipient tests in Pease and Mannai, ultimately my defence wouldn’t stand. I still haven’t yet fully read those cases, but I believe that they had been based on clerical or typographic drafting errors made in the course of [I] filling out the form [/I], not material differences in the form itself, including in obsolete citations of crucially important legal provisions that gave different (considerably extended) notice periods. If someone mixed up 2017 for 2018 when 2017 had already past, then a reasonable recipient without legal training could surmise what was meant, but where the very statutory purpose of prescribed forms is to educate lay men on their legal positions, surely outdated legal provisions being cited as the legal framework under which the notice is served must be fatal to the prescribed form.
A form with a custom, landlord advice uk-branded colour motif in its letterhead and bottom page numbers would surely pass the substantially the same effect, but a form that differs materially in its content or substance, to me, should not be saved by Pease or Mannai.
Anyway, I then did a FOI request to the DLUHC for all past versions of the prescribed form 3 (for section 8 notices) and, lo and behold, quell surprise, at least in the case of the prescribed form 3 versions, the mistake was of our bright ole’ chum Mr. Charles’s, and not of the government, pitifully useless as it often is.
The directions were to make any representations as to the invalidity of the notice or other defences within 3 weeks of the initial hearing, and then for claimant to make any counter-representations as to the validity of the notice within 2 more weeks after that. I then struggled to find representation to help me put forth my defence, FOI response in hand, before a series of other unfortunate personal events prevented me from managing to research the procedural mechanics for putting it forth myself, and then a letter got lost in the mail notifying me of the listed follow-up hearing. Some time before the listed hearing day, I got an email from the claimant mentioning the hearing day that I had no notification of, so I actually went to the court itself to inquire as to if the case had been listed yet, and was arrogantly blown off by a particular idiot doorman at the courthouse who adamantly insisted that if I hadn’t gotten the letter, it would only be because it hadn’t yet been sent, due to severe court backlogs, while refusing to go back and check into it for me as some of the less disingenuous staff there would regularly gladly do. On the advice of a nice paralegal receptionist of one of the at-capacity housing firms I inquired to, I turned up to the hearing on the day, which in retrospect I think must have been a mistake.
Mr. Charles sent a more impressive barrister on the day, and they were lucky with a particularly sympathetic judge that seemed to be zealously pro-landlord or else just didn’t like the look of me. The barrister’s quick-witted tact also probably helped matters there.
Mr. Charles had typed up a 3 page skeleton argument, which I think just argued what you would have expected, concerning “substantially to the same effect” etc, with a presently-impressive bunch of case citations interspersed throughout. I head it on the day, and meant to go off and research the authorities it cited to do an analysis, but alas it was likely since lost in (at least partially) predictable events that would follow.
The judge ruled that, despite any disabilities and personal health issues or solicitors capacity shortages contributing to it, my failure to comply with directions meant that he could choose whether to consider my defences or not, and that he would (apparently, quite smugly) choose not to. Declined to hear my defence, refused permission to appeal, refused to hear exceptional hardship arguments, didn’t give any chance to argue against transfer to HCEO, and indeed gave permission for transfer to HCEO.
First attempt at execution of writ, without any notice of permission to seek writ or any of the procedural steps listed by shelter as required in the HCJ enforcement-transfer process, during BS moratorium. HCEOs stubbornly refused to call it off and persisted on the day, trying violently to shove past the community resistance brigade that had mobilised to stop them.
I then had to go away for a few days for personal reasons, and was surprised when neighbours kept on telling me each day that no new N54 had been posted to the front of the door in the type of transparent plastic envelope as required and as had been used prior to the BS moratorium-flouting attempt previously.
In any event, even if it had, and they had somehow gone blind and missed it, or were just deceiving me, I knew that there would need to be at least 14 days between the end of the DRM/BS and any date of execution that could be notified by an N54 under CPR 83.8A, and while I was surprised that apparently no new N54 like last time had yet come, even if that were not true and it had, and, for example, had just been torn down and binned by some punk neighbour before it could be seen, I would still have had another 6 days until it could possibly be executed in which to pack my things and/or possibly seek a stay. Well, on the morning of the day that I was anyway to return, I saw an email informing me that “the eviction procedure had been carried out this morning,” while I would have 24 hours to collect my things before they were disposed of (surely a breach of the Torts (IWG) Act!), and I never panicked and yelled so much in my entire life. I could barely calm myself enough to gather my belongings and get a train back down. Due to all the panicking, I actually missed 2, and probably would have happened to get back down earlier, had I not seen the email.
I stayed up all night writing a stay of execution application which I then raced in the morning to get printed and submitted to the HC/KBD (speaking of which, they are quite, quite awful, given all of the so, so, disingenuous blowings-off of my COUNTLESS COUNTLESS phone, email and in-person inquiries and requests for the paperwork in the case so that I could either take it to a solicitor or look at it myself so as to prepare an application for a stay), which brought it before a judge who wrote on the application that “after the writ is executed I can only seek recourse in the county court.”
Surely this must be wrong, in the sense that I would see the logic, if the writ had actually been properly executed, in compliance with all of the procedural rules of permission to enforce in the HC, and 83.8A, etc, etc. But where it is merely that an eviction had been carried out, in disregard of the rules by which it may be lawfully done, what occurred could not have been the execution of the court’s writ, but an extralegal/unlawful eviction, such that the writ’s validity could still be stayed on such concerns such that I would at least have a stay to show to the police.
Anyway, I arrived 5 minutes past their ultimatum of noon to collect my things, and they hadn’t yet begun loading it onto a Bulgarian rubbish removal man’s truck, which they’d only shortly start to do. As it was, I had missed the ultimatum despite madly racing, by 5 minutes, so I had no time to stop off at the county court lest I lose all of my things.
The police then arrived some minutes later, and I was honestly amazed that they seemed able to comprehend my lesson on the BS/DRM regs so as to grasp the logical and mathematical impossibility, given the documentation that I had of my DRM period’s end date, of an eviction on that day being proper. That was the decent cop that was outside speaking to me, anyway.
Then his partner who was inside speaking to the claimant came out and said “no, they’ve got a court order, it’s all good, it’s legal.” The decent cop tried to explain to him a bit, and it seemed to be going in the right direction, before they then both went inside and apparently were put on the phone with the official/head HCEO who assured them that it was all fine and proper. The good cop then came out and said you’re not going to like this, but I’ve seen the paperwork and the notice and the second notice, and it all looks legit with yesterday’s date on it. It’s all from the court.
I insisted that it was impossible, and whatever was from the court must be fake, because by the CPR 83.8A it was a mathematical impossibility, and he said, “well, somehow they got it from the court, so just go to citizen’s advice head office and take it from there.” I was literally in tears. He said he’d have the claimant send the notice forms to me by email, which they did, and it turned out that what they had claimed to use (though I strongly suspect they didn’t actually do) was actually an N54A.
Now N54A is when you’ve tried once, properly, and then perhaps been obstructed by a community union/activist brigade who are in essence denying the proper administration of the lawful authority of the court. I can’t really imagine it being judicially entertained that you could be rewarded by having the N54A 7 day notice period available to you by attempting ILLEGALLY to take enforcement action DURING a BS/DRM period, and then once it’s over just say “well, we tried once already (never mind that it was during an enforcement moratorium that we disregarded), and look what happened! Therefore we should be able to ambush them with N54A ‘notice of further attempt’ any time after 7 day process anyway.”
Anyway, amid all the chaos and commotion, I did see a soppy/rainy A5 manila envelope with a folded up paper on top of it that was in fact an N54A notice of further attempt dated the day after my BS/DRM ended, and warning of eviction “on or after” the date that it happened (8 days after the notice’s own date). I filmed it on the ground and myself approaching it and picking it up. This raises a big question to me as well, because why would it have been folded in half to A3 size and lying on top of a manila envelope as if it were posted as mail when the CPR 83.8A clearly requires certain formalities like a transparent envelope, etc. It makes me think that they had simply brought it on the day in case it was needed to show police. I mean how did it end up on the outside of the building on the pavement as well, if it didn’t fall from someone’s hands or pockets?
Anyway, this was all the dirty tactics of Mr. Charles. I sincerely hope he gets a proper comeuppance for the harm he’s done.
Anyway, just to quickly add to this:
1. I have actually spent a somewhat embarrassing amount of time searching for Mr. Charles’s appearance on the BBC slum landlords series, but have reached the conclusion for the time being that it actually never happened but is rather just another deception.
2. In case Ben is reading this, I honestly don’t see how my CW at SR somehow figured that all of these dirty tactics could have actually been proper and lawful. I should keep them posted on the outcomes as it all progresses, but for the time being, it was really rather strange and eyebrow-raising logic that was used in the letter…
That is a lot of verbiage. But what I’m gathering is:
1. You contested the section 8 notice at first hearing and were ordered to file a defence (the duty solicitor expressed doubts about the defence).
2. You did not file a defence.
3. At the next hearing, in large part because you had not filed a defence, a possession order was made, and the matter transferred to the High Court for enforcement, which you were therefore aware of.
4. No notice of permission to seek a writ in the High Court is required, where the County Court has given permission.
5. An attempted eviction took place, for which you were given notice.
6. I have no idea where the moratorium stuff comes in. Or what you mean by BS.
7. Form N54 doesn’t have to be affixed to the door. It just gets posted. That is good service. Apparently you went away, relying on someone else telling you if a notice had been stuck to your door. Nor does form N54A have to be affixed to the door, just posted to the address.
8. You can’t stay an eviction that has already happened. You can only appeal. The Court was quite right.
I’m sorry but apart from possibly (depending on the facts) Sasha Charles’ role in the initial possession claim, which should have bee challenged at first or second hearing, but apparently wasn’t, I’m not seeing anything wrong here. If you are defending a claim and are directed to file a defence, you have to file a defence. The rest follows.
1: I proposed multiple defences to the duty solicitor, including Charles’ thinly-veiled involvement in the claim (on which more later), and he wasn’t interested in any of them except for the notice-validity point, which he called “the most attractive,” and argued vigorously. It was only after the hearing that he had second, more doubtful thoughts, referenced to the reasonable recipient tests of Pease and Mannai.
4: I suppose you are probably right on this point, in which case Shelter’s advice pages appear to be wrong:
Here it states, first (under the heading “Requirement for High Court permission”), “If the landlord’s application to transfer is granted by the County Court, the landlord must obtain the High Court’s permission before the writ of possession is issued”. It then states, under the next heading of “Landlord’s notice of application for permission” that: “When permission to enforce a possession order in the High Court is sought, the landlord must give notice of the application to ‘every person in actual possession’ of the property. The High Court must not grant permission unless each tenant is given such notice as the Court considers sufficient.”
In other words, it appears to make reference first to a process of “transfer” of the case (to the high court for enforcement), and then to one of “permission to enforce.” The requirement of seeking permission from the high court to issue a writ is not described as hinging on there not having been previously permission given by the county court for transfer under s42 (or alternatively permission given by the high court under s41), it seems to just be described as its own, free-standing requirement to be observed irrespective of what other steps have been followed elsewhere in the process.
In summary, it seems that the Couty Court had given an “order,” in the language of s42 CCA 1984, while, at least according to Shelter, the High Court still needed to give “permission,” for which some “sufficient” notice to the occupiers would have been required, if Shelter is correct in its article.
5: On my reading of UKSI 2020/1311, regs. 7(6)(c) and 7(6)(d), what took place was an attempted unlawful eviction. Reg. 7(12) seems to me to suggest that the notice of this unlawful eviction attempt may as well also not have been given.
6: The moratorium was entered under the statutory scheme of UKSI 2020/1311, commonly known as breathing space or respite moratoriums. Apologies for not being more clear.
7: Upon reviewing CPR 83.8A, I was mistaken about what it says, and you are of course right:
“(4) The notice of eviction and any further notice of eviction or further notices of eviction must each must be delivered by—
(a) inserting it through the letter box in a sealed transparent envelope; or
(b) if that is not practicable—
(i) attaching a copy to the main door or some other part of the land so that it is clearly visible; or” […]
Strangely, there appears to be at least two typos in the CPR where it says “must each must”. I’m surprised nobody’s found that yet.
Anyway, what was odd was that the inital notice, the original N54, was conspicuously duct taped to the building front door in a glossy transparent sleeve, despite it in fact being perfectly well practicable to insert it through the building front door’s letter box. They would have also been fully able to go inside of the building and slide it under the door of the actually-sought property, though that one didn’t have a letter box. This, along with perhaps a panicked reading of the CPR 83.8A, led me to believe that fixing it to the main front door was the standard/required procedure.
When you say that N54 and N54A can just be “posted,” I assume you mean by hand, and not via the Royal Mail or another postal service.
In any event, the N54A was not posted in a transparent envelope, as above required by 83.8A(4), but in an opaque manila paper envelope, unlike the N54, which was as mentioned duct taped along its edges to the main building door in a transparent plastic sleeve.
8: Again, it is hard for me to see how one could properly avail the 7-day 83.8A(2)(b) N54A process simply by virtue of having tried already by brute force to push past people during a UKSI 2020/1311 moratorium, on the back of a 14-day 83.8A(2)(a) N54 notice (which was also given during the moratorium, and thus, apparently under the regulations, “null and void” and may as well not have happened). On this logic, I would have argued that what had happened was an eviction, albeit an unlawful one, but not the enforcement of the writ which could only be done in accordance with the proper procedural rules. Isn’t a writ essentially the court extending its authority for the claimant to take possession of a specified party IN ACCORDANCE with established rules and procedures? If they go and take possession in disregard of such rules, then can it be said that the writ itself has actually been executed?
“I’m sorry but apart from possibly (depending on the facts) Sasha Charles’ role in the initial possession claim,”
What I noticed was that while, after your report of his telling off by the court for flouting the LSA 2007, as demonstrated by his signing of the claim form, he had taken to having the claimant sign the claim form in their own name, as if as a litigant in person, but then under contact details (if I recall, in the box for contact details that says “if applicable” (which I had read as meaning, “contact details of the formal legal representative, in case there is one”)), there was given an email address of “admin@landlordadvice.co.uk.” Now if this isn’t what is literally described as “conducting” the litigation, then I’m not sure what is, if all correspondence to and from the court with the claimant is to be mediated by Mr. Charles’s firm, but at least he didn’t “sign the claim form” which I guess was given by the county court as a tell-tale indication of having conduct.
“which should have bee challenged at first or second hearing,”
The duty solicitor, sadly, wasn’t interested in this and stayed only concerned with the notice point.
“I’m not seeing anything wrong here.”
Even given the clarification of the BS Moratorium issue?
“If you are defending a claim and are directed to file a defence, you have to file a defence. The rest follows.”
This I understand, although I’d also think that there is discretion for courts to hear verbal defences in disabled, lay defendants in circumstances of exceptional strain on LA firms, and where my notes from phone advice by the duty solicitor on how to file my own defence were illegally seized by some bully cops to make my life difficult on some silly vindictive charges that were immediately dropped on explicitly both limbs of the CPS Charging Test. You kinda had to be there to see what I meant about how unsympathetically disingenuous the particular judge was in deliberately fudging my arguments just enough to be invalid or even incoherent in recounting them back to me before rejecting them, but the overarching principle that you voice above, as a starting point, is of course sound.
But it still seems trumped by the N54/N54A/BSDR-moratorium issue which seems insurmountable for Mr. Charles.
1. Without knowing the other defences (and see below on Sasha Charles involvement), the duty solicitor, in the ten minutes or so they would have had to appraise the situation, was probably right.
4. – On notice of application for permission for a High Court writ, see Partridge v Gupta from 2017. https://nearlylegal.co.uk/2017/08/sufficient-notice/
On the N54A, you well may have a point. But that would be an application for re-entry, not a stay of an already executed eviction.
HCEOs have a history of bending the law. We had an epic battle about the use of N293A (as was) back kin 2015/2016 – see for example https://nearlylegal.co.uk/2016/03/righting-wrong-writs-high-court-enforcement/ – but Partridge v Gupta disposed of a lot of those issues.
On your 5, eviction following a possession order is not enforcing a moratorium debt (unless the possession order is in relation to a charging order or other security for or enforcement of qualifying debt), assuming the possession order was given for rent arrears prior to the moratorium being entered. Enforcing a money judgment for arrears may be covered, but not the eviction.
(Same applies to your 8. It is not enforcing a moratorium debt).
On Sasha Charles and conducting litigation, you are certainly right about him giving his details as legal representative as amounting to conducting litigation. That is not necessarily a defence to the claim – though it would make a mess of first hearing for his client. Look at what happened in Ojo & Opaleye v McAuliffe https://nearlylegal.co.uk/2019/02/u-cant-do-this/
Raising an oral defence – you get that leeway at first hearing, absolutely. Hence then the direction to file and serve a defence. You can’t really have a position where the claimant has to turn up to the second hearing without any idea of the case they have to meet, and without there being any documentary evidence or witness statements before the court.
Anyway, while I’m glad to have related all of that, what I had initially meant to comment on was, concerning:
> “But MHCLG do not make archive copies of the How to Rent guide available.”
Perhaps the solution to this is a simple FOI request for past archival versions and dates, drafting notes, and changes of each incremental update so that it’s all out on official record. In fact, I think I may just go and put that in through WhatDoTheyKnow.com right now, so that all can benefit from it in 4 weeks’ time.
We have an archive here. Did you miss that bit?
Well, no, and I think I’ve even consulted it before. I was more just getting at the fact that you shouldn’t have to make the effort of maintaining and staying on top of it, and that, in case for whatever reason in the future it either proves easier or offers more information or insight, not least because the government in its outward publications can be inconsistent, cryptic and contradictory, there happens also to be an alternative route, possibly even to its correspondence or drafting notes in addition to just the empirical changes themselves, which could take additional effort to identify between versions.
You are absolutely right I shouldn’t have to. But it shouldn’t take FOIs either, which is really only useful for the person making the request. MHCLG should have a public archive, with identified changes.
“is only really useful for the person making the request” – this is true, if the resulting disclosure is not subject by the respondent body to a so-called “publication scheme,” where requests deemed suitable according to some unclear criteria that probably amounts to “generalisable public interest in subject matter” are published on the web, or if it is not in the first place done through a publicly-visible request management platform, ie WhatDoTheyKnow.com, or, if the requester (or subsequent reader) doesn’t decide to publish the response on their blog…
For an example of the former phenomenon, see this disclosure, which may have been requested via direct email at some point by yours truly: https://www.met.police.uk/foi-ai/metropolitan-police/disclosure-2023/october-2023/new-operational-guidance-on-attending-illegalextra-legal-eviction-calls/
For one of the second, look at this: https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/c/90uy9x151fm8ubvasrh
For instance of the third, well… I’ll leave that to the imagination of the reader.
As for “with identified changes,” hopefully this will fill the bill in four weeks’ time. Perhaps the call for annotations and accompanying notes will shed light on the rationale for some of the more capricious and puzzling editions that we’ve seen, as well.
Of course it would be on What Do They Know if done that way. But that is still not a solution (and would only be a snapshot in time). It should be a publicly available and maintained MHCLG archive.
The changes made are mostly obvious, I think. Can’t think of any puzzling or capricious ones (apart from chenging the title of the guide, which was bloody stupid – https://nearlylegal.co.uk/2018/07/how-to-rent-guide-a-bit-of-a-snafu/ )