Housing case law update: June 2023 – Local Government Lawyer

‘Catherine Craven and Jane Goodier round up the latest housing law cases and court decisions of interest to housing associations and local authorities.’

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Local Government Lawyer, 7th July 2023

Source: www.localgovernmentlawyer.co.uk

Landlord claimed to be “lost at sea” ordered to pay £44k over housing offence – Local Government Lawyer

‘A South Gloucestershire landlord has been ordered to pay more than £44,000 after a court found him guilty of a serious housing offence and for contravening a Local Government Act.’

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Local Government Lawyer, 4th July 2023

Source: www.localgovernmentlawyer.co.uk

Landlord claimed to be “lost at sea” ordered to pay £44k over housing offence – Local Government Lawyer

‘A South Gloucestershire landlord has been ordered to pay more than £44,000 after a court found him guilty of a serious housing offence and for contravening a Local Government Act.’

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Local Government Lawyer, 4th July 2023

Source: www.localgovernmentlawyer.co.uk

Appeals against Housing Act 2004 decisions as a “rehearing” – Local Government Lawyer

Posted July 3rd, 2023 in appeals, fraud, housing, landlord & tenant, licensing, local government, news, reasons by tracey

‘In a recent case the Court of Appeal has held that when a First-tier Tribunal (Property Chamber) (“the FTT”) hears an appeal against a decision under the Housing Act 2004 as a “rehearing”, the FTT must consider whether the authority’s decision was wrong by reference to facts that existed at the time of its decision, and must also give sufficient deference to the authority’s original decision. Simon Kiely and Francesca Gallagher analyse the ruling.’

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Local Government Lawyer, 30th June 2023

Source: www.localgovernmentlawyer.co.uk

Selective licensing offences and the level of civil penalties – Local Government Lawyer

Posted July 3rd, 2023 in fines, housing, landlord & tenant, licensing, local government, news by tracey

‘Simon Kiely and Francesca Gallagher examine useful Upper Tribunal guidance on the approach the First-Tier Tribunal should adopt when considering the level of civil penalties on appeal.’

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Local Government Lawyer, 30th June 2023

Source: www.localgovernmentlawyer.co.uk

Grenfell Tower and Awaab Ishak tributes as social housing bill passes – BBC News

‘A move to strengthen social housing rules in the wake of the Grenfell Tower fire and the death of a toddler from exposure to mould is set to become law.’

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BBC News, 27th June 2023

Source: www.bbc.co.uk

What happens after a banning order? The further adventures of Mr Rasool – Nearly Legal

‘Mohammed Rasool has featured here quite often, for getting an ASBi against him for illegal eviction, for his role in quite the bizarrest set of cases, in which he sought re-entry after alleged illegal eviction to properties he had no interest in and didn’t occupy, and for receiving a five year banning order, amongst other things. But the fall out of his track record of truly terrible landlording, and assorted criminal offences continues. Here is a new press release from Camden Council, on the outcome of their latest prosecution of Mohammed Ali Abbas Rasool and associated entities.’

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Nearly Legal, 23rd June 2023

Source: nearlylegal.co.uk

Wales: The Good, the Bad and the Converted – part 1 – Nearly Legal

Posted June 26th, 2023 in housing, landlord & tenant, news, notification, Wales by tracey

‘Followers of the updates under Renting Homes (Wales) Act 2016 (“the Act”) will be well aware of many of the changes implemented in the Welsh housing law “big bang” on the 1st December 2022 (“the appointed day”), most recently written about on Nearly Legal here. My primary focus in this post focuses particularly on those developments affecting “converted contracts” – those contracts which had moved over from one of the previous tenancy regimes on the appointed day.’

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Nearly Legal, 23rd June 2023

Source: nearlylegal.co.uk

Council appeal succeeds after Upper Tribunal finds landlord questioned during First Tier Tribunal hearing was wrong person – Local Government Lawyer

Posted June 22nd, 2023 in landlord & tenant, licensing, news, penalties by tracey

‘The Upper Tribunal has remitted a decision concerning the penalty for an unlicensed landlord to the First Tier Tribunal after it became apparent that the man thought to be the landlord in the First Tier Tribunal hearing was, in fact, the landlord’s father.’

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Local Government Lawyer, 22nd June 2023

Source: www.localgovernmentlawyer.co.uk

The Renters’ Reform Bill: changes to grounds for possession – Local Government Lawyer

Posted June 9th, 2023 in bills, housing, landlord & tenant, local government, news, repossession by tracey

‘Helen Tucker examines the changes to the grounds for possession as set out in the Renters Reform Bill published on 17 May 2023.’

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Local Government Lawyer, 9th June 2023

Source: www.localgovernmentlawyer.co.uk

On the naughty step – a ‘rising star’ of Barking – Nearly Legal

‘Sadly, it appears that it is necessary to revive the long lapsed tradition of the Nearly Legal Naughty Step post.

We have encountered a number of councils putting, or trying to put, damn silly clauses in their tenancy agreements for secure tenants, and then threatening to evict tenants who breach these damn silly clauses. There was Sandwell silencing tenants, for example (and they were not alone in trying to include such a clause). And there was the spectacle of Wandsworth attempting to impose a clause forbidding the tenant, their household, or their visitors from behaving badly anywhere in the whole borough, on pain of eviction. That one – which is all too relevant for what follows – ended in humiliation for Wandsworth when they actually tried to use it.’

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Nearly Legal, 6th June 2023

Source: nearlylegal.co.uk

‘Fake bailiffs’ from private security companies carry out illegal evictions – The Guardian

‘Vulnerable families are being tricked out of their rented homes by private security guards dressed like court bailiffs, a charity has warned.’

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The Guardian, 4th June 2023

Source: www.theguardian.com

Court of Appeal clears up leasehold confusion – Law Society’s Gazette

Posted June 1st, 2023 in enfranchisement, landlord & tenant, Law Commission, leases, news, rent by sally

‘The Court of Appeal has had the latest say on shared ownership leaseholders’ right to take over the management of their building – an area where the Law Commission has previously said the landscape is unclear.’

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Law Society's Gazette, 31st May 2023

Source: www.lawgazette.co.uk

Shared Ownership and Right to Manage – Nearly Legal

Posted May 31st, 2023 in appeals, landlord & tenant, leases, news by sally

‘This was the Court of Appeal judgment on a an appeal related to (but not from) the Upper Tribunal decision in Avon Ground Rents Ltd v Canary Gateway (Block A) RTM Company Ltd & Anor (2020) UKUT 358 (LC) (Our note here). At issue – and it is nice to have a Court of Appeal matter that is simply on a single point of law – was whether shared ownership leases where the lessee has a less than 100% share were long leases, and so qualifying tenants for the purposes of section 76 Commonhold and Leasehold Reform Act 2002.’

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Nearly Legal, 30th May 2023

Source: nearlylegal.co.uk

Renters Reform Bill: Warning changes could ‘decimate’ student market – BBC News

Posted May 25th, 2023 in bills, housing, landlord & tenant, news, universities by tracey

‘Plans to abolish fixed-term tenancies in England would “decimate” the student housing market, landlords have warned.’

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BBC News, 25th May 2023

Source: www.bbc.co.uk

Renters (Reform) Bill – overview Part 2 – Nearly Legal

Posted May 19th, 2023 in animals, bills, housing, landlord & tenant, leases, news, rent by tracey

‘Following on from yesterday (17 May) publication of the Renters (Reform) Bill and Part 1 of my overview of what the Bill does, onwards to the rest of it. Pets! There has been a lot of fuss about this, but as Tessa Shepperson has sagely observed, it doesn’t really make much of a change to existing law. The Bill adds an implied term that the tenant has a right to request to keep a pet and that the landlord cannot unreasonably refuse such a request. Where the landlord’s own lease forbids pets, or requires the superior landlord’s consent, the landlord is to request this. It is not unreasonable for a landlord to refuse permission if their superior landlord had refused consent, or if the landlord’s own lease forbids pets.’

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Nearly Legal , 18th May 2023

Source: nearlylegal.co.uk

Tighter damp and mould regulations set to impact registered providers – Local Government Lawyer

‘Six months after the conclusion of the inquest into the tragic death of Awaab Ishak, Matthew Bown and Amy Cowap outline the various measures set to be implemented to ensure tighter regulation of registered providers of social housing, with a specific focus on damp and mould issues.’

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Local Government Lawyer, 17th May 2023

Source: www.localgovernmentlawyer.co.uk

Renters (Reform) Bill – the good, the potentially good and the ugly. Part 1 – Nearly Legal

Posted May 18th, 2023 in bills, housing, landlord & tenant, news, repossession by sally

‘It is finally here, a mere five years from first being promised. The Renters (Reform) Bill has started its parliamentary journey today (17 May). As it stands, it is the largest reform to tenancies in England since 1988 (Wales having done its own, even more significant, thing).’

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Nearly Legal, 17th May 2023

Source: nearlylegal.co.uk

Research Briefing: The regulation of letting and managing agents (England) – House of Commons Library

Posted May 17th, 2023 in estate agents, housing, landlord & tenant, news, parliament by sally

‘This paper describes the current regulatory regime in England and plans to strengthen regulation of letting and managing agents.’

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House of Commons Library, 16th May 2023

Source: commonslibrary.parliament.uk

Suitability review – excluding information, and ending existing accommodation – Nearly Legal

Posted May 2nd, 2023 in housing, landlord & tenant, local government, news, statutory duty by tracey

‘Querino v Cambridge City Council. County Court at Cambridge, 29 March 2023. Continuing the trend (of which I wholeheartedly approve) of people sending me notes of judgments, the following is a note of a s.204 appeal of a suitability review decision from Toby Vanhegan of 4-5 Gray’s Inn and Manjinder Atwal of Duncan Lewis, for which we are very grateful. The issues were i) whether a “minded to” letter should have been sent, ii) whether the council should have been satisfied that the applicant could end his licence in time to take up the offer of Part VI accommodation, and iii) the review officer had wrongly excluded the applicant’s supporting material from CAFCASS.’

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Nearly Legal, 1st May 2023

Source: nearlylegal.co.uk