R Greenwich Community Law Centre v Greenwich London Borough Council
| Jurisdiction | England & Wales |
| Judge | Mr Justice Cranston |
| Judgment Date | 21 December 2011 |
| Neutral Citation | [2011] EWHC 3463 (Admin) |
| Court | Queen's Bench Division (Administrative Court) |
| Date | 21 December 2011 |
| Docket Number | Case No: CO/1969/2011 |
[2011] EWHC 3463 (Admin)
IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUSTICE
QUEEN'S BENCH DIVISION
ADMINISTRATIVE COURT
Royal Courts of Justice
Strand, London, WC2A 2LL
Mr Justice Cranston
Case No: CO/1969/2011
Jonathan Manning and Robert Brown (instructed by GCLC) for the Claimant
Jason Coppel (instructed by Greenwich LBC) for the Defendant
Hearing dates: 14–15 December 2011
INTRODUCTION
The claimant is a law centre ("Greenwich CLC"), providing free legal advice and assistance. It challenges the decision of the defendant local authority (the "Council") to cease funding it, with effect from 11 November 2011. In broad terms it contends that in doing that the Council failed to have regard to the consequences, in particular the impact of the decision on its existing vulnerable clients. It also challenges the decision-making process as regards aspects of the work which the Council decided to fund. That process resulted in the allocation of funds to Plumstead Community Law Centre ("Plumstead CLC") and Greenwich Housing Rights respectively. The Council denies that the decision is unlawful. Moreover, it contends that since Plumstead CLC and Greenwich Housing Rights have received funding and taken over the services formerly provided by Greenwich CLC, any remedy which interfered with that position would be detrimental to third parties and highly prejudicial to good administration.
BACKGROUND
Greenwich Community Law Centre was established in 1984. Like other law centres in this country it provides free legal advice and assistance to some of the most vulnerable people in its community, in this case in the Greenwich area of London. Its work has been mainly in the fields of immigration, welfare benefits, housing, employment and debt. The law centre is based in the western part of Greenwich borough. For the last 15 years or so it has provided outreach services. As well it gives advice by telephone and receives enquiries by telephone and email. In addition to funding from the Council, the law centre has received income from the Legal Services Commission, the Equalities and Human Rights Commission and some private funders. Its premises have been occupied rent free from the Council.
From about 2007 until April 2011 Greenwich CLC was a member of a consortium called Greenwich Legal Advice Services ("GLAS"). The other members of the consortium were Greenwich Citizens Advice Bureau, Plumstead CLC, Meridian Money Advice, and Greenwich Housing Rights. The first is based in Woolwich, which is near to the centre of the borough, with a branch in Eltham. Woolwich is also where Greenwich Housing rights is based. Plumstead CLC is in the eastern part of the borough. During the period to April 2011, the Council funded GLAS to provide legal advice services. As part of that arrangement, Greenwich CLC received around £199,000 per annum to provide advice services in the areas of work mentioned. Funding being consortium based, clients with a particular problem could approach a range of organisations across the borough.
–2013 framework and interim agreement
In February 2010 the Council's cabinet agreed a draft "third sector commissioning framework for 2011–2013". The third sector includes charities and community and voluntary groups. Under it consultations occurred with the third sector in the first part of that year. In mid July bids were invited. GLAS bid as a consortium, the only bid received for legal advice services. It had been intended that the Council's overall voluntary sector grants budget for the third sector for 2010–2011 would be some £7 million. Following the announcement of the government's comprehensive spending review in October 2010, however, there had to be significant reductions in the Council's budget for grants. On 3 December 2010 the deputy leader of the Council, Cllr. Peter Brooks, wrote to all third sector organisations explaining the anticipated reductions and adding:
"Organisations are therefore reminded that their current funding arrangements will expire on the 31 st March 2011, and that you will need to take whatever appropriate legal steps are needed for dealing with any adverse impact on your organisation as a result of the expiry of funding. For instance, this may include issuing precautionary notices of redundancy to employees by 1 January 2011 where this is appropriate for you to do so."
Ultimately the Council proposed to reduce funding for the third sector to some £4,841,000, to be augmented by an additional £683,000. That meant a reduction of just under 30 percent, which was comparable to the reduction applied to the Council's budget as a whole.
The Council's cabinet made provisional decisions on the allocation of its third sector grants and commissioning budget on 25 January 2011. It agreed to defer final decisions until its March meeting. It requested the Council's Overview and Scrutiny committee to undertake an examination of the process in the meanwhile, including the assessment of bids and decision-making process, and of its provisional funding proposals. At this point there was an initial equality impact assessment. Cabinet agreed that a full equality impact assessment, informed by consultation and representations, should be presented at its March meeting. Following the cabinet meeting representations were invited from the voluntary sector affected by the provisional funding decisions. Greenwich CLC, as part of the GLAS consortium, made a submission.
The Overview and Scrutiny committee met and prepared a report. It agreed with the cabinet's provisional funding decisions with the exception of a number of what it regarded as priority areas, where the cabinet was asked to reconsider. One of these was in relation to the GLAS consortium. Overall, the Overview and Scrutiny committee concluded that the commissioning process was sufficiently robust and provided good support for groups to enable their participation in the bidding process. However, there were areas identified for further improvement, including equality impact assessment. The committee recommended support and guidance to third sector organisations, which should take account of issues relating to the cessation of funding "of some smaller groups and the impact which could arise on some locally based and socially isolated groups". The committee recognised that interim funding would be necessary until final allocations later in the year.
At its 15 March 2011 meeting, the Council's cabinet agreed the recommendations of the Overview and Scrutiny committee. Cabinet delegated to the Director of Culture and Community Services, in consultation with the deputy leader, the decision to agree interim provision for legal advice services. It also agreed that there should be re-commissioning in the advice and legal services area, with a further report to be presented to cabinet. The explanation for this re-commissioning decision for legal advice services was set out in a later report to the Overview and Scrutiny committee (dated 12 May 2011):
"The previous strategic review of legal advice services, approved by Cabinet in 2008, had sought a single provider for a unified and fully integrated service across areas of law and advice need. The aim was to deliver a comprehensive, accessible service in the most efficient way possible, mirroring the Council's own service modernisation principles. However, no single provider applied to deliver this approach and the attempts to develop an effective local consortium have now twice failed to satisfy the Council's requirements. In particular, the local consortium has not been able to put in place a single governance framework, a shared approach to performance management or effective collaboration on delivering efficiencies."
The Council's Equality Policy requires equality impact assessments for all proposed new plans or policies for which significant changes are proposed. There was an equalities impact assessment before cabinet on 15 March 2011. It was said to meet the recommendations of the Overview and Scrutiny committee, in particular that it take account of issues relating to the cessation of funding of some smaller groups and of the impact which could arise on some locally based and socially isolated groups. The equality impact assessment noted that the reduction in the grant budget and associated funding would inevitably have an impact upon residents. No viable bids having been received for the provision of legal and welfare advice services, the equality impact assessment recommended that financial provision be earmarked, and that there be a re-commissioning of services. In the light of financial pressures and the difficulty in commissioning it further recommended that Council funding be augmented by including the Council's own advice services in order to stimulate a more viable response. Representations from GLAS were noted. These were that the reductions in funding would reduce the number of people able to access advice services, and that national welfare and housing tenure reforms, and potential job losses arising from the economic climate, would lead to an increased demand for advice. GLAS had also stated that there was a potential for a disproportionate impact in respect of race, gender, disability and age, since 74 percent of their clientele belonged to black and minority ethnic groups, 21 percent were disabled and 22 percent were lone parents. The assessment identified as mitigating action that the re-commissioning of legal advice services would...
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