Tenants win right to judicial review
Posted in: Discussion | Legal debate
08/07/2008 8:57 am
A High Court ruling last month has given tenants the right to challenge their landlords' decisions.
The judgement questions the independent status of housing associations by making the accountable in much the same way as public sector bodies.
Are there any tenants out there who think this will help? Or housing association who are concerned about the threat to their status?
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14/07/2008 7:09 pm
Yes, clearly RSLs are public companies and always were. However, probably with an eye on how this would imping upon 'Contract Law' it was never made so.
More recently it has been explained to me that the real and underlying reason is that if RSLs are public companies then their massive borrowings becomes a part of the PSBR.
It was a sham and a trickery upon the people to attempt to describe them as 'private companies' and not in the interests of the residents
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15/07/2008 10:41 am
While this ruling is welcome it will do very little to redress the balance to help tenants.
In practice the greatest majority of RSL tenants have no resources or abiltiy to take an SRL to court. And so RSL (at least mine, London and Quadrant) goes on harassing me and bullying me. We need a specialist court for each borough, chaired by a judge assisted by tenants representatives, landlords representatives and housing experts where a tenant can just put to them the facts and reasons and a landlord can argue them and viceversa with the least of burocratic procedures and paperwork involved.
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15/07/2008 1:15 pm
Lost the original so hope this does not turn up twice under discussions. What you say is very true John, but not because tenants are not entitled to protection under the Human Rights Act, but because its simply unaffordable for tenants of RSLs. Indeed, if they could afford such luxury they would probably be in a private dwelling anyway !
However, there is a way where a tenant who has no assets and relies totally upon benefits to bring an action using Legal Aid , the action would be taken by one person, but the ruling would apply to everybody !
Currently, you may know, Sheltered Housing is under official attack and changes in the Government methods of funding is causing RSLs to withdraw their Warden services throughout the country. Residents have implied contracts with their RSLs to keep the Wardens but nobody has contested them for a breach of contract yet ! Now we have added the Human Rights Act which could prove very useful. People opted to live in Sheltered Housing because of its Warden services, to arbitrarily take those services away could well be a breach of their Human Rights and that is something they could not have done until the recent ruling that RSLs are public companies. More of the Sheltered Housing problems can be found on the web-site www.shelteredhousinguk.com
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15/07/2008 1:34 pm
Yes, tenants have rights. But as I said in practice the greatest majority of us cannot enforce them. And if you have money because you have a good job what you do? Give up your job to undertake a court case? and even then the money you had from your job is not going to go very far as you do not know where it will end.
And what legal system is there that the rest of us tenants have to wait for a hapless completely destitute tenant to win a case against RSL landlords who have no budget limits for their court cases?
How long one has to wiat for that?
And what if it never happens?
It seems a outrgeous way of the legal system to protect us and others in similar situations as wrongs should be corrected as quickly as possible to stop prolonging injustice and unfairness.
However I am ready to fight and if any tenants have any court action or trial agaisnt my landlord London and Quadrant please do contact me as I would like to be involved.
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15/07/2008 3:26 pm
Do tenants have a right to challenge their (RSL) landlord or not?
The ruling referred to dis lean towards stating that housing associations may be public bodies or they may act in the same way as public bodies. From this the judge concluded that a challenge against them may be amenable to judicial review but I would argue that this isnot the same as tenants having a legal right to challenge HAs.
Rather, the ruling appears to state that as HAs may oprate similarly to councils (in their housing functions / duties) then a challenge to them by a tenant by way of JR is allowed. In simple terms a potential legal hurdle or constraint has been removed that previously prevented such a challenge. This is radically removed from challenge being a tenants right.
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15/07/2008 6:47 pm
Hi Joe,
We have corresponded before. How goes it ? The information I have is from and Inside Housing publication which you can find on www.shelteredhousinguk.com. It seems straight forward enough , whereas tenants were not entitled to a JR they are appears to be the message.
Source has suggested to me that in their opinion the Government may contest this for reasons of protecting the figures on the PSBR, spoken about earlier
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17/07/2008 12:18 pm
I would suggest that DEFEND COUNCIL HOUSING should change into defend SOCIAL HOUSING or something similar and include the Housing Association and Housing Trust tenants. Council tenants and Housing Association tenants need to be together at least at national level, while at local level you can have branches like for example DEFEND CAMDEN COUNCIL HOUSING and DEFEND LONDON AND QUADRANT TENANTS. Social Housing can only be strong if we speak with one powerful voice. Of course there might be (there will inevitgably be) teething problems about how the various democraticv representatives will be elected both at local and national level. But once embraced the principle of each tenancy one vote we have to work to make everyhting accountable and transparent. But right now we have to applaud and support - AND JOIN - any initiative to bring about some effective say for tenants. DEFEND COUNCIL HOUSING is a great example how to go forward and hopefully get better and better...
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17/07/2008 1:43 pm
Defend Council Housing is about the worst model anyone could choose to represent the interests of tenants in the social sector. Indeed, anyone suggesting this organisation as the way forward is either hopelessly naive or else is playing at the type of deceitful, underhand and corrupt politics which DCH engages in.
DCH is no more than a acceptably-branded front outfit for public sector unions who have interests in continued state management of housing. Those interests are almost invariably in conflict with the interests of social housing tenants. Take one example. Social housing staff enjoy a 20% boost to their pension contributions courtesy of the management fees and therefore the rent paid by the tenant. That is, the unions have succeeded in screwing this arrangement out of successive governments to the detriment of some of the poorest individuals in the country.
Now look at DCH. Who funds this organisation? Who pays for its newspaper? Who organises its marches/protests/demonstrations? Only be closely examining its pubished literature can you discover that it is actually Unison and the GMB union who set it up and fund its continuing activities.
Big point this. Does DCH conform to the rules that apply to most democratic organisations in the UK which seek representative rights such as annual elections of officers, a constitution, an agm, a statement of income/expenditure? No it doesn't. The principals who claim to speak for tenants have never been elected to that position. That they choose to operate in this fashion should give cause for concern to every tenant.
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17/07/2008 1:43 pm
Defend Council Housing is about the worst model anyone could choose to represent the interests of tenants in the social sector. Indeed, anyone suggesting this organisation as the way forward is either hopelessly naive or else is playing at the type of deceitful, underhand and corrupt politics which DCH engages in.
DCH is no more than a acceptably-branded front outfit for public sector unions who have interests in continued state management of housing. Those interests are almost invariably in conflict with the interests of social housing tenants. Take one example. Social housing staff enjoy a 20% boost to their pension contributions courtesy of the management fees and therefore the rent paid by the tenant. That is, the unions have succeeded in screwing this arrangement out of successive governments to the detriment of some of the poorest individuals in the country.
Now look at DCH. Who funds this organisation? Who pays for its newspaper? Who organises its marches/protests/demonstrations? Only be closely examining its pubished literature can you discover that it is actually Unison and the GMB union who set it up and fund its continuing activities.
Big point this. Does DCH conform to the rules that apply to most democratic organisations in the UK which seek representative rights such as annual elections of officers, a constitution, an agm, a statement of income/expenditure? No it doesn't. The principals who claim to speak for tenants have never been elected to that position. That they choose to operate in this fashion should give cause for concern to every tenant.
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17/07/2008 1:43 pm
Defend Council Housing is about the worst model anyone could choose to represent the interests of tenants in the social sector. Indeed, anyone suggesting this organisation as the way forward is either hopelessly naive or else is playing at the type of deceitful, underhand and corrupt politics which DCH engages in.
DCH is no more than a acceptably-branded front outfit for public sector unions who have interests in continued state management of housing. Those interests are almost invariably in conflict with the interests of social housing tenants. Take one example. Social housing staff enjoy a 20% boost to their pension contributions courtesy of the management fees and therefore the rent paid by the tenant. That is, the unions have succeeded in screwing this arrangement out of successive governments to the detriment of some of the poorest individuals in the country.
Now look at DCH. Who funds this organisation? Who pays for its newspaper? Who organises its marches/protests/demonstrations? Only be closely examining its pubished literature can you discover that it is actually Unison and the GMB union who set it up and fund its continuing activities.
Big point this. Does DCH conform to the rules that apply to most democratic organisations in the UK which seek representative rights such as annual elections of officers, a constitution, an agm, a statement of income/expenditure? No it doesn't. The principals who claim to speak for tenants have never been elected to that position. That they choose to operate in this fashion should give cause for concern to every tenant.
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17/07/2008 3:33 pm
I admit I do not know much about DEFEND COUNCIL HOUSING. However I do know that tenants wishes, needs and rights are continuously and outrageously dismissed by RSLS (some of them any way). Now the only way for tenants to have any effective says is to have a strong organisation. If you do not like DEFEND COUNCIL HOUSING, please go on and set up your own and if youre more democratice and all that i - and I guess many others - will join you. Otherwise, please, do go on fighting DEFEND COUNCIL HOUSING for it to be more democratic and accountable - and if that's it's true I will join/support you. But what I am saying is: we need a national tenants organisation to defend social housing and its tenants - so just let's get on with it.
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17/07/2008 3:39 pm
It seems rather strange Michael that tenants of Council Housing should not 'band' together under any banner, be it Unison or whatever , if they do not like what is happening to them. That is called 'democracy', or are they not allowed to because you do not like Unison ?
As for additional costs, in most cases the in-office housing director of the local council that transferred, became the director of the new RSL at a massively increased salary, and lavish new offices had to be set up too and, incidentally, there is a clear cut place for council housing because valuable members of society who do the 'rotton' jobs and without which the country would grind to a halt, could never contemplate buying a house on their salaries. Then there are the disadvantaged and down on their luck tenants too.
Incidentally, I understand, that the Government realised too late when they embarked on privatisation that it created an imbalance between what pre existing Housing Associations charged for rent and what the newly privatised dwellings were charging. Added to that was a preferential borrowing rate. Since the Government were insisting at the time that RSLs were private companies it left them open to the charge that they were favouring the new RSLs with public money.
Result of that was the introduction of Rent Restructuring and Target Rents, which forced up the rents for ex council houses to make them compatible with what housing associations were charging
Regards
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17/07/2008 10:15 pm
Can we return to the question please? This was about the potential impact of a legal ruling that may have significant consequences. It was not about the merits (or not) of Defend Council Housing or other new tenant lobby group, or was it about the general 'bad lot' tenants claim to get from their landlords.
I'm not denying that these are worthwhile discussion topics but why not raise them under a different thread?
This ruling may well lead to a case that (a) fails and (b) that the initial apparent ruling that RSLs are public bodies be overturned. Then the important discussions over tenant lobbies and /or DCH also wither away - hence raise them separately.
Conversely, if the case wins and thisopens the door for RSLs / HAs to be seen as 'public bodies' then the impat will be massive. Such a thread then will have many more aspects and dimensions. It could lead to HAs all handing back stock tocouncils, or handing back all homelessness functions. It couldlead to all HAs moving to a totally new formof allocations polcies so to dilute any notion that they are similar to councils. What impact would that have??
It may lead to HAs losing charitable status (unlikely but possible). Then what would differntiate large HAs from private landlords?
Whilst the latter point is admittely unlikely, the previous are not so far fetched. Anything like this would deal a massive blow to any concerted attempt to utilise housing stock in terms of social policy.
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17/07/2008 10:38 pm
What are Housing Associations or Trusts but a compromise between public and private finance? The private finance will be there as long they make the profit they are happy with, like with any other business. This is why tenants are suffering - because the private finance has nothing to lose - the moment it gets tough either they will pull out or force the governement to pour more money in their pockets. They have been raking it all these years with no risk of any loss. That's why the Housing Associations and Trust will never go private. Because then they will have to run the same risks of any private landlords, and why should they when can they make money without any risk at all - with the governement always there to cover their backs?... I think it has come the time now for the governemnt to reform housing associations and make them solely public by gradually replacing the private finance with public investment. Only then we will have a healthier social housing sector, shielded from speculators and so-called Housing Associations who behave exactly like a private landlord.
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17/07/2008 11:35 pm
Hello again Joe, When this first cropped up a very learned gentleman wrote to me ( unfortunately I did not keep his address) He explained that the European Human Rights Act applied to all walks of life and was not divided into public and private companies. The type of tenure was unimportant, he said.
Too true the RSLs will not like it, but because they do not should not mean that a large section of the community will deprived of certain aspects of Human Rights i.e. they will continue to be enjoyed by a council tenant, but you lose them if they transfer to an RSL
I think it would be very difficult to reverse the judgement now because the reasons for trying to reverse it will beecome suspect
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22/07/2008 9:54 am
Vernon - I dont disagree with the view expressed on Human Rights Act. However, the point I was making was one of legal procedure.
In oversimplified terms, Judicial Review is available against a public body and not against a private one. Hence, the position that HAs may be akin to a public body allows JR whereas previously this could not happen. That is a significant manifetation of this ruling. So, when I say that tenant actions against a HA are now amenble that is precisely the point I was making - that this is now possible.
HAs have always been seen as some form of quasi-public body but never defined as a public body before this ruling. I agree this whole area requires clarification.
However, just because you act like a public body does not neessarily mean (a) you are one and (b) you should be classed as one legally. For example, it is public policy that third-sector organisations are being courted to carry out previous public roles. Indeed, many private firms since Compulsory Competitive Tendering etc are perorming duties or responsibiities formerly delivered by public authorities. Does this make them public bodies (and ergo amenable to JR?)
If it did would third-sector or private organisations ever bid for suh contracts? The danger in seeing this as a clear cut issue would mean that councils would likely have to deliver all services. For some that is a frightening thought with significant financial and qualitative consequences for all, including tenants.
This is why this matter is not a simple one and one that will have far-reaching consequences
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22/07/2008 10:22 am
Hello Joe,
A well thought out reply, for which I thank you. But, I do not believe that it will make a lot of difference to bodies tendering for contracts. If some wont then others, and new ones too, will emerge that will.
Human rights will , of course, be inconvenient to commerce, but so is tax, and consumer protection laws. They will get used to it or, more to the point. They will have to get used to it.
The only real problem that I can see, is if the Courts could handle an upsurge in litigation .
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14/04/2009 5:22 pm
There is also the serious problem with regard funding by the (so called) Community Legal Service, who refuse to grant funding for Tenant versus Landlord disputes.
This is because the Community Legal Service are prejudiced against Tenant's anyway, and perceive us as unworthy and undeserving of funding.
My Wife and I have considerable experience in this matter, as last year we tried unsuccessfully to get a judical review against A2Doinion Housing Group, and after months of waiting for a decision from the CLS we were turned down.
So where do we go from here?
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17/03/2010 12:07 pm
yes well one more hoop to go through to obtain slight justice.
I have gone through every hoop put in front of me including going to the LVT as advised in my Tenancy agreement only to have HA argue that the LVT is the wrong venue! Service charges are again taken out of the sky for 2010, the HA have been taken to the Housing Ombudsman so often they must know the rules back to front and my case will be heard in 10 to 12 weeks. In the meantime the Judge wants to see the Housing Ombudsmans decisions before he makes a decision on a bogus case brought by the HA for rent arrears when they know the arrears are service charges arrears! The joke is that everyone knows and still pretend to have some sort of system going. HA's do as they please because they know that in the end nothing will come of complaints- hell they do not even have to answer the telephone nor emails because there is no one out there who cares enough to do anything. Lets have a laugh at your local housing association day where we could just call up and laugh at the clowns who walk about in their suits, egos spilling out, spend amounts of money undreamed of by most and demand respect from the people they are paid to serve for treating them with contempt. What a joke.
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