A certain amount of amusement has been circulating around London housing firms at the Court of Appeal judgment in London Borough of Southwark -v- Onayomake [2007] EWCA Civ 1426 (Bailii link, or link to WLR case note here, but may only be briefly freely...
Convicted – Evicted
Raglan Housing Association Ltd v Fairclough [2007] EWCA Civ 1087. Basically, Housing Act 1988 Schedule 2 Ground 14 (b) means that if if you have been convicted of an indictable offence committed in, or in the locality of, the dwelling-house the discretionary...
Demoted Tenancies and Human Rights
Just a quick note on the Admin Court decision in Gilboy, R (on the application of) v Liverpool City Council & Anor [2007] EWHC 2335 (Admin). The Anti-Social Behaviour Act 2003 modifies Housing Act 1985 and 1996 to allow a secure tenancy to be changed to a...
Overcrowding and homelessness
Right then, Harouki v Royal Borough of Kensington & Chelsea [2007] EWCA Civ 1000. The scene in a nutshell. A statutorily overcrowded household, in terms of Part 10 of the Housing Act 1985, s.326, which gives rise to a criminal offence under s.327 A homeless...
Busy, Busy, Busy
I'm flat out at the moment. Even my usual posting windows of a Saturday or Sunday have seen me either too tired or working to manage a post. So all I can manage is to point to two cases for Housing people's attention, to which I will return when I have time....
Homelessness and Ex Parte Injunctions – a warning
Mr Justice Munby has issued a stern statement on the use and abuse of ex-parte injunction applications to the Administrative Court in R (Lawer) v Restormel Borough Council [2007] EWHC 2299 (Admin). Covering failure to use the Pre-Action Protocol,...
Homeless with shared residence order
[Edit Feb 2008 - Richmond have been given permission to appeal this judgment to the House of Lords. No date yet.] An interesting situation, if perhaps an increasingly common one, has just been set out in the Court of Appeal case of Holmes-Moorhouse v London...
Reincarnation of Tenancy?
This is more of a question than a post, a question on a problem that I think I understand, but that I hope has a better conclusion than the one I've got to. The issue is when can a new tenancy be effectively said to have arisen after a Suspended Possession...
Do it yourself
A strong argument for not pursuing a case as a litigant in person can be found in this case. That said, hats off to the applicant for at least getting a Judicial Review hearing in person. Not least after turning up two hours late. There is an indication that...
Disability and tenancy – More on Malcolm
I posted on Lewisham v Malcolm ten days ago. Since then a couple of commentors have raised issues and Tessa has posted on the implications of the case at Landlord Law. So it seemed worth a further look. The caveat is that what follows is my understanding of...
Quantum in Disrepair
I've been meaning to post on this for a while and have been prodded into life by quite a few searchers on the topic. The reason I've been delaying is that, frankly, it is a bit of a sod. Unlike the carefully calculated, quantified, actuarialised and...
Possession claims dropping? Not all.
The latest figures, up to Quarter 2 2007 are available on the Ministry of Justice site, link to the PDF. The figures show quite a drop in the Q2 figures for non-accelerated possession claims issued (including claims by Councils and Housing Associations)...