I've got two Upper Tribunal decisions on bedroom tax appeals, both from Scotland. Both concern human rights related cases. One concerns what sounds like a fairly hopeless and sadly not well argued case based on disability. The other is considerably more...
A longer waiting to wait
Barnet Council are consulting on changes to their 2012 Allocation policy. The main change proposed is that the current 'residence requirement' of two years be increased to five years. That is to say that no-one would be eligible for Barnet's housing register...
Mortgage possession: Lloyds and the arrears that weren’t
From the High Court in Northern Ireland comes a significant joined case of a mortgage lender behaving badly. Bank of Scotland, and indeed possibly the whole Lloyds group seem to have acted in this way, for which they have received an extremely severe...
Eviction: “Sexual, athletic and squeaking noises”
In a case that recalls the 'unnatural' noises emanating from Concord, Tyne and Wear, a German Court was faced with a tricky decision in a claim for possession. The ground given was that the tenant had installed a 'very old' sex swing in 2012. And, despite a...
Odds and Sods
A few bits and pieces, none of which are worth their own post, including a couple of updates on old 'friends'. First, as you have probably noticed, the blog has had a redesign (yes, another one). There are a couple of reasons for this: partly for a more...
Bedroom tax and human rights FTT miscellany
No less than four FTT bedroom tax appeal decision have come my way lately. Three of them concern successful appeals on human rights Article 14 discrimination or Article 8 family life grounds. One is a clear room size decision with an interesting footnote on...
On the Naughty Step: Incredible Landlords and the buzzy DCLG
It is hard for a civil servant, with a predisposition to reticence, obfuscation and paper, to know what to do in an age where ‘amazeballs’ and ‘bedroom tax’ have entered the Oxford English Dictionary, and even the dictionary is only available online. How,...
Indecent homes and major works charges
The DCLG has released the "Social landlords reduction of service charges: mandatory and discretionary directions 2014", in force as of today, 12 August 2014. The upshot of the mandatory directions is that a social landlord which undertakes "repair,...
Reasons, reasons, reasons
This slipped under my radar, but thanks to @RichGreenhill on twitter for pointing to Section 7 of The Openness of Local Government Bodies Regulations 2014, in force as of 6 August 2014. Section 7 provides: 7. (1) The decision-making officer must produce a...
DHP not enough to remedy?
We've received an interesting First Tier Tribunal (so not binding) appeal decision from Wakefield, thanks to Kirklees Law Centre. A copy of the statement of reasons is here (not anonymised as the appellants consented to it being used largely unredacted). Mr...
Help me make it through the night
We have the first (to the best of my knowledge) Upper Tribunal decision on a bedroom tax appeal, and therefore one binding on First Tier Tribunals. While it is not on one of the large scale issues, such as room size, it is nonetheless potentially important...
Bedroom tax ‘lead case’ in Upper Tribunal?
Some bits on the bedroom tax and room size First, a new FTT decision from Rochdale (Reasons here ). A room of 64 square feet was too small for a lodger and had not been used as a bedroom since the appellant’s son moved out in 2010. The room was instead...