The court was asked whether a local authority can lawfully bind itself by contract to subject the exercise of its statutory power to vary its tenancy agreements by notice to the approval of tenants’ representatives.
Held: The local authority could not fetter its right in that way. The authority had a statutory power of management under section 21 of the Housing Act 1985 which was exercisable ‘for the single purpose of regulating secure periodic tenancies’ and that a contractual clause preventing it exercising its right of unilateral variation was ‘simply incompatible with the Council’s statutory right and power to vary their tenancies unilaterally.’
Rix LJ said: ‘The need for such a unilateral method of varying tenancies can be readily acknowledged. A local authority may have thousands of housing units. Circumstances, or changes of policy, may require it to be able to vary the terms of its tenancy. If such variation had to be sought severally and bilaterally, the local authority’s housing stock could become impossible to manage, in breach of its duty under section 21.’
Judges:
Buxton LJ, Rix LJ, Moses LJ
Citations:
[2007] EWCA Civ 479
Links:
Statutes:
Jurisdiction:
England and Wales
Cited by:
Cited – Peabody Trust v Reeve ChD 2-Jun-2008
The court was asked to sanction the unilateral alteration by the landlord of the terms of some ten thouand tenancies. The agreements contained a clause which the landlord said allowed for variations under the Housing Act 1985. The landlord was a . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Housing, Local Government
Updated: 27 November 2022; Ref: scu.252460