Gloria Elsy Rodriguez Robles, R (on the application of) v The London Borough of Lewisham

Local housing authorities have a wide discretion when formulating and operating housing allocation schemes, subject to statutory requirements and the ordinary public law limits of rationality and legality. A court must read such a scheme practically and with common sense. It must not imply a right to retain a former priority date where a new scheme has substantively changed the relevant eligibility criteria and expressly or impliedly requires reassessment. An applicant has no right to a particular priority band, but has a right to have the application considered under a lawful scheme. Administrative disadvantage, unfairness in a general sense, or an authority’s failure to communicate every consequence of a policy does not, without more, establish a public law breach.

The claimant was registered for social housing under the defendant local authority’s 2017 allocation scheme because her settled accommodation was overcrowded by one bedroom. She received a priority date of 10 May 2021.

A new scheme came into force on 31 October 2022. It introduced a lower Band 4 for applicants overcrowded by one bedroom and a Band 3 for applicants who were also statutorily overcrowded. The claimant was initially placed in Band 4, later moved to Band 3 after demonstrating statutory overcrowding, and given a new priority date. The authority ultimately exercised discretion to backdate that date to 31 October 2022, but refused to restore the 10 May 2021 date.

The judicial review challenged the authority’s construction and application of the 2022 scheme, and alleged irrationality.

1. The claim was dismissed. Neither the 9 December 2024 decision nor the 2022 scheme, so far as it applied to one-bedroom overcrowded applicants, was unlawful.
2. Section 159(7) of the Housing Act 1996 gives a local housing authority substantial latitude in deciding how housing accommodation should be allocated. The court must intervene where statutory requirements are not met or a scheme is plainly irrational, but there is no right to a house or to a particular priority band.
3. Following R (Ariemuguvbe) v Islington Borough Council, the 2022 scheme had to be read practically, with common sense and without excessive legalism. Properly construed, it did not require or permit applicants moved from Band 4 to Band 3 to retain their former Band 3 dates.
4. The 2022 scheme was not a continuation of the 2017 scheme for one-bedroom overcrowded applicants. It introduced substantive changes, including statutory overcrowding as a new criterion, automatic reassessment into Band 4, and a requirement to demonstrate the additional criterion before moving to Band 3. The resulting priority date therefore ran from the relevant change of circumstances, subject to the authority’s later discretionary adjustment.
5. The lack of clear communication in the scheme, guidance and initial letter about the loss of the former date was regrettable, but did not invalidate the scheme. The claimant was placed in a better priority band after the successful application than she would have occupied had she remained in Band 4. Apparent inconsistent treatment of five other applicants had been corrected and did not make the claimant’s decision irrational.
6. The court rejected any general power to overturn a discretionary decision merely because it operated to the claimant’s disadvantage. No classic public law error was established.