Maali, R (on the application of) v Lambeth

A housing authority’s medical assessment must address the evidence bearing on the applicant’s condition and the effect of the accommodation. An assessment is Wednesbury unreasonable where it mischaracterises material evidence or relies on an unsupported medical inference. Although an unlawful allocation scheme may justify relief, the court retains discretion over the form of a mandatory order. It may order a limited reassessment where the relevant category carries a sufficiently high threshold to ensure reasonable preference, while refusing wider relief that would create an impractical and unfair ad hoc allocation scheme.

The claimant, an existing Lambeth tenant living with her children in a third-floor maisonette without a lift, sought judicial review of Lambeth’s housing allocation scheme and of an assessment refusing her emergency medical priority. Lambeth accepted that its allocation scheme did not comply with Housing Act 1996, as amended by the Homelessness Act 2002. The court considered whether the 8 August 2003 medical assessment was lawful, whether further assessment or allocation-related relief should be ordered, and whether wider declarations were appropriate.

1. The medical assessment was unlawful. A housing medical adviser exercising delegated assessment functions need not be a medical practitioner, provided that the adviser is otherwise suitable in law. The court rejected the challenge to the adviser’s qualifications.
2. The assessment itself was Wednesbury unreasonable. First, it treated the claimant’s staying with a friend as principally arising from childcare needs, although the available evidence indicated that severe asthma could make climbing to the third floor impossible. No adequate basis was given for rejecting that evidence. Secondly, the adviser treated stair-climbing as beneficial exercise without establishing any necessary connection between that activity and asthma control, and failed to account for the claimant carrying her young child and shopping.
3. The court refused the wider mandatory order sought under section 167(2) of the Housing Act 1996. Comparing the claimant with applicants in the mainstream group would not be workable because Lambeth had no sufficient details of those applicants. It would also create an unfair, temporary scheme benefiting applicants able to bring judicial review proceedings.
4. The court nevertheless ordered a reassessment for Group B, with the assessment to be completed within 28 days. The high threshold for Group B meant that a successful applicant would plainly receive the reasonable preference required by section 167(2).
5. Wider declarations were refused because the Court of Appeal had already determined that Lambeth’s existing scheme was unlawful and further declarations would add nothing. The 8 August assessment was quashed. The claimant received her costs.

The judgment records earlier proceedings concerning Lambeth’s allocation scheme:

• High Court: The scheme was held unlawful in R (L & D) v London Borough of Lambeth and R (Lindsay v London Borough of Lambeth).
• Court of Appeal: Those decisions were upheld on 23 November 2002 in R (A and Lindsay) v London Borough of Lambeth, with mandatory orders made.
• Administrative Court: The present claim resulted in the 8 August 2003 assessment being quashed and a limited reassessment order.