R(Anon) v LB Southwark (Claim No CO/2035/2014 - settled by consent) Courtesy of Hansen Palomares Solicitors comes news of this settled Judicial Review of LB Southwark's gatekeeping practices on homeless applications. It appears, to put it mildly, that...
Illegal occupation is no bar to adverse possession
Best, R (On the Application Of) v The Secretary of State for Justice (Rev 1) [2015] EWCA Civ 17 The Court of Appeal considered the clash of s.144 LASPO and the rules on adverse possession, on appeal from the Administrative Court. Our report on the Admin...
On the naughty step: The Low Road edition
While there is an update to be made on our old friends Charles Henry & Co (the 'not solicitors'), it will have to wait, because we have some new and very, very special friends. And excitingly, these friends involve us in both Scots land law and Channel...
Refurbishment
The site had been getting a bit unwieldy lately as things got added - the downloads, the bedroom tax page and so on - plus the ever burgeoning archives. Then there were glitches with the email updates for subscribers. So, I have done a bit of a revamp, with...
Shared care isn’t occupation as a home.
A short Upper Tribunal decision has put an end to bedroom tax appeals based on the 'part-time' residence of a child of a separated family with shared care. MR v North Tyneside Council and Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Housing and council tax...
Proposed changes to S.21
As well as the clauses introducing the retaliatory eviction proposals, the Government's proposed amendments to the Deregulation Bill would make some other changes to s.21. The effects would be: No s.21 notice can be served within the first 4 months of the...
The revenge of retaliatory eviction law
After the Teather 'revenge eviction' member's bill was talked out by a couple of Tory MPs, (Chope and Davis), the question was would the proposals survive in another form before the election. Well today, the DCLG announced the Government's proposed...
Email subscription problems
There appears to be a problem with update emails going out - at least for the last 3 or 4 days. This is not a problem with our end of things, but there is no acknowledged problem by the provider of the email update service (Google, via feed burner). The...
Nuisance and reasonable steps
As an illustration of the perils of a claim in nuisance, here is Yianni v Shakeshaft [2014] EWCA Civ 1639 [Not on Bailii. We've seen a transcript] Ms Y is the leaseholder of a flat below that of Mrs & Mr Shakeshaft, who had a tenant in theirs. There had...
Babes out of the Forest
The out of borough temporary accommodation position continues to get worse, with increasing numbers of homeless shipped out of borough (and for London councils, often out of London). London Councils (pace Nzolameso v Westminster CC ) have put the DCLG...
Unnoticed
Another Court of Appeal disrepair judgment! I can barely contain myself. And on a fairly important issue too. So.. Edwards v Kumarasamy [2015] EWCA Civ 20 Mr Edwards rented a second floor flat from Mr Kumarasamy. Mr K was the leaseholder of that flat, but...
Just because you are paranoid…
... doesn't mean that they aren't out to get you. The MoJ and Legal Aid Agency have put out a leaflet on Legal aid and "Help for people at risk of losing their home". The trouble is that it doesn't mention, anywhere, at all, not even in little small print,...