LB v London Borough of Tower Hamlets

For intentional-homelessness purposes, the reasonableness of continued occupation under section 191 is assessed at or about the time of the applicant’s deliberate act or omission which caused the loss of accommodation. The assessment must disregard the applicant’s culpable act or omission.

However, a reviewing authority must consider all relevant information available by the date of its review, including subsequent events which inform whether continued occupation would probably have led to domestic or other violence under section 177. The authority must assess the risk arising from continued occupation as a whole. It is not confined to incidents physically occurring at the accommodation.

The appellant was evicted from a privately rented home because of rent arrears. She had previously experienced domestic violence and harassment from her former husband, against whom three non-molestation orders had been made.

The respondent decided that she was intentionally homeless. Following a review under the Housing Act 1996, the reviewing officer found that it would have been reasonable for her to remain in the former accommodation. The County Court dismissed her statutory appeal.

Before the Court of Appeal, the central issue was whether the reviewing officer had unlawfully assessed only the likelihood of violence occurring at the former home, and had applied the wrong date for assessing the reasonableness of continued occupation.

1. Appeal dismissed. The reviewing officer was entitled to find that the appellant had intentionally become homeless and that it would have been reasonable for her to continue occupying the former property.

2. Section 191(1) of the Housing Act 1996 directs attention to the time when the applicant deliberately does, or fails to do, the act which causes the loss of accommodation. The question is whether continued occupation would then have been reasonable, disregarding the culpable non-payment of rent. Section 177 supplies the answer where continued occupation would probably lead to domestic or other violence.

3. The temporal focus does not confine a review to evidence available when the deliberate act occurred. Applying Denton v Southwark LBC, [2008] EWCA Civ 623, and the review principles in Mohammed v Hammersmith and Fulham LBC, [2001] UKHL 57, the authority had to consider all relevant circumstances up to the review decision. Later events could inform whether continued occupation at the relevant earlier time would probably have led to violence.

4. The reviewing officer had made enquiries about events after the eviction, the non-molestation orders, alleged breaches, and incidents at the children’s schools. Read fairly and benevolently, the review decision assessed the risk arising from continued occupation generally. It did not confine itself to violence physically occurring at the former property.

5. The weight to be given to the evidence was for the authority. In the absence of an error of principle or logic, the court could not substitute its own factual evaluation. The officer had not made the impermissible value judgment, identified in Bond v Leicester City Council, [2001] EWCA Civ 1544, about what the appellant should have done to avoid violence.

• Court of Appeal (Civil Division) — dismissed the appellant’s appeal and upheld the County Court’s dismissal of her statutory appeal: [2020] EWCA Civ 439.
• County Court at Central London — on 4 March 2019, HHJ Gerald dismissed the appellant’s appeal under section 204 of the Housing Act 1996.
• Reviewing Officer, London Borough of Tower Hamlets — on 7 August 2018, upheld the authority’s decision that the appellant was intentionally homeless.