This week's award for literalism goes to William Lyttle. Mr Lyttle, apparently not realising that 'fall' and 'collapse' are usually metaphors when applied to property, spent 40 years excavating a labyrinth of tunnels under his Hackney property. Mr...
All the blog posts, most recent first
How not to pick a fight
Let us say you were a large US company, looking to throw around your intellectual property muscle for a quick buck by putting a licensing squeeze on small companies. If so, it is probably best not to pick on a small tech company headed by an...
Women's refuges and homelessness
Manchester City Council v Moran & Richards v Ipswich Borough Council [2008] EWCA Civ 378 This is a very important Court of Appeal judgment, which will have significant impact on Women's Refuges and women fleeing domestic violence. These were...
Deposit scheme mandatory award
Just a quick note to say that Housed has a report on a County Court judgment on a claim for failure to put deposit in scheme and notify tenant within 14 days. (Stankova v. Glassonbury 10th March 2008, Gloucester County Court. Initial report...
Shala revisited?
London Borough of Wandsworth v Allison [2008] EWCA Civ 354 is a Court of Appeal judgment on an appeal from a s.204 Housing Act 1996 appeal. It was made in downright odd circumstances, as the respondent had won the s.204 appeal but then had public...
Libel, fraud and child trafficking
Or 'On the Naughty Step...' Thanks to Mark P for the idea, I bring you news of scandal and criminality from the world of housing, albeit with only the most tangential relationship to housing law. Gentoo, a Sunderland based RSL and its CEO, Peter...
Hey, you asked 2
More brief but hopefully helpful replies to the civil litigation and housing questions that brought searchers to Nearly Legal. As ever, nothing of what follows should be taken as legal advice and no action should be taken without obtaining full...
Hodge woz wrong – official
It may have taken nearly a year after Margaret Hodge's 'they come over here taking our housing' outburst, but it turns out that she was wrong (and I was right, so there). The early findings of a major survey into social housing allocation ordered...
Discretionary Housing Payments
A short note on Gargett, R (on the application of) v London Borough of Lambeth [2008] EWHC 663 (Admin) which was an application for Judicial Review on Discretionary Housing Payments. The applicant had applied for a DHP to cover rent arrears, being...
Non-secure tenants
Just a quick comment on Westminster CC v Boraliu [2008] EWCA Civ 1339, which is not on Bailii yet. I was alerted by Housing View at Sweet & Maxwell. This was Court of Appeal decision on the effect of Schedule 1, Housing Act 1985 on exclusions...
Butterfingers
In what must be probably the worst experience a paralegal could ever have, Penny Wadsworth has inadvertently caused the collapse of a 5 defendant, £100,000 drugs trial [Guardian Report]. The 'Kennington Rastafarian Temple' trial had been running...
Blogging to death?
Apparently some high output bloggers have been dropping dead, leading the New York Times to blame the pressure of blogging. but as Jeremy Blachman points out, 'middle age geek who never leaves their computer has heart attack' is a somewhat less...