The fact that the accommodation found to be available to the applicant for housing was in Bangladesh did not make it unavailable in law. The subsections must be read separately. Accommodation could be available to the applicant even though she could not afford to travel to it. The power of the County Court to hear an appeal in such matters included the power to deal with all matters which might be heard in the High Court, including those equivalent to judicial review. The Code is not an authoritative guide to interpretation of the Act.
Auld LJ summarised what is meant by an appeal on a point of law in the context of section 204(3):- ‘It is that ‘a point of law’ includes not only matters of legal interpretation but also the full range of issues which would otherwise be the subject of an application to the High Court for judicial review, such as procedural error and questions of vires, to which I add, also of irrationality and (in) adequacy of reasons. This broad construction of the provision is supported by the somewhat wider or more immediate power to vary given to the county court by section 204(3) than the High Court normally exercises in its judicial review jurisdiction.’
Auld, Stuart-Smith, Sedley LJJ
Gazette 17-Nov-1999, Times 09-Nov-1999, [2000] 1 WLR 306, [1999] EWCA Civ 3051, [2000] COD 31, (2000) 32 HLR 445
Bailii
Housing Act 1985 175 (1) 175(3) 204(3)
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – Regina v London Borough of Camden ex parte Pereira CA 20-May-1998
When considering whether a person was vulnerable so as to be treated more favourably in applying for rehousing: ‘The Council should consider such application afresh applying the statutory criterion: The Ortiz test should not be used; the dictum of . .
Cited by:
Cited – Harouki v Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea CA 17-Oct-2007
The applicant sought housing as a homeles person. Her present accommodation for herself, her husband and five children was so overcrowded that continued occupation was a criminal offence. She appealed a finding that it was reasonable to continue . .
Cited – London Borough of Wandsworth v Allison CA 15-Apr-2008
The claimant had applied for emergency housing, saying that he had suffered a deep vein thrombosis, and was vulnerable under the 1996 Act. The authority said that its finding that the VT would not put him at additional risk if homeless, was one of . .
Cited – Waltham Forest v Maloba, The Law Society CA 4-Dec-2007
The applicant had been refused accomodation as homeless after disclosing the ownership of a family home in Uganda. He had lived and worked in the UK for 15 years. The authority did not accept that it had later been repossessed. The council now . .
Cited – Hotak and Others v London Borough of Southwark and Another SC 13-May-2015
The court was asked as to the duty of local housing authorities towards homeless people who claim to be ‘vulnerable’, and therefore to have ‘a priority need’ for the provision of housing accommodation under Part VII of the Housing Act 1996. Those . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Housing, Litigation Practice
Leading Case
Updated: 11 November 2021; Ref: scu.78321