The Queen (on the application of Ruba Imam) v The London Borough of Croydon
| Jurisdiction | England & Wales |
| Judge | Mathew Gullick |
| Judgment Date | 26 March 2021 |
| Neutral Citation | [2021] EWHC 739 (Admin) |
| Court | Queen's Bench Division (Administrative Court) |
| Docket Number | Case No: CO/889/2020 |
| Date | 26 March 2021 |
[2021] EWHC 739 (Admin)
IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUSTICE
QUEEN'S BENCH DIVISION
ADMINISTRATIVE COURT
Royal Courts of Justice
Strand, London, WC2A 2LL
Mathew Gullick QC
(sitting as a Deputy Judge of the High Court)
Case No: CO/889/2020
Sarah Steinhardt (instructed by Deighton Pierce Glynn) for the Claimant
Kelvin Rutledge QC (instructed by Browne Jacobson LLP) for the Defendant
Hearing date: 6 October 2020
Approved Judgment
Deputy Judge Mathew Gullick QC:
Introduction
This is a claim for judicial review in respect of the Defendant's failure to provide suitable accommodation for the Claimant pursuant to its duty under section 193(2) of the Housing Act 1996 (“the 1996 Act”). The Defendant admits that it is in breach of its statutory duty because the accommodation that it is presently providing to her is not suitable. The issue between the parties in relation to breach of statutory duty is as to the relief which should be granted to the Claimant: she contends that a mandatory order should now be made requiring the Defendant to provide suitable accommodation to her. The Claimant also raises other challenges, including alleged breaches of the Equality Act 2010 (“the Equality Act”) and an allegation of unlawfully failing to determine the Claimant's request to be given Band 1 priority under the Defendant's housing allocation scheme.
The hearing of the Claim took place by way of video-conferencing using the Microsoft Teams platform, under the arrangements adopted in consequence of the COVID-19 pandemic. I am very grateful to both Counsel for the assistance provided to me in their skeleton arguments and at the hearing in relation to all the issues which I have to determine. The written and oral arguments on Ground 1 were of a particularly high standard. I have considered all the evidence and arguments put before me when reaching my conclusions, although I will only refer in this judgment to those matters which are necessary for me to reach my decision.
Background
The Claimant is a wheelchair user and is disabled within the meaning of section 6 of the Equality Act. In February 2014, she applied to the Defendant for accommodation to be provided to her. The Claimant is a single mother who has for the last six years (i.e. since October 2014) lived with her three children in a property in Croydon, which was allocated to her by the Defendant as temporary accommodation under Part 7 of the 1996 Act (“the Property”); before that, the Defendant had accommodated the Claimant in ‘bed and breakfast’ accommodation. The Claimant's partner also moved into the Property in around March 2019. The Claimant is on the waiting list for permanent accommodation to be provided to her by the Defendant under Part 6 of the 1996 Act. She has been given priority under the Defendant's housing allocation scheme, being placed in priority Band 3.
The Property is a terraced house with a large garden, although the garden is not wheelchair-accessible and the family's use of the garden is therefore limited. No issue has been raised regarding the location of the Property, in terms of its suitability for access to services such as public transport and schools. The Property has been the subject of certain adaptations. There are three bedrooms on the upper floor, one of which (the Claimant's) is partly filled by a large lift which also takes up much of the living room below it and which enables the Claimant to travel between the ground floor and the upper floor. The only bathroom at the Property is on the ground floor; it has been adapted into a ‘wet room’ with a toilet.
The Defendant's initial disability housing assessment, conducted in February 2014, noted that the Claimant was a full-time wheelchair user and recommended accommodation with a number of features including a single level property or one that had a through-floor lift, an adapted kitchen and a wheelchair-accessible bathroom that was on the same level as the bedrooms (and, if the property was on more than one level, a further wheelchair-accessible downstairs toilet).
The Claimant viewed the Property in September 2014 and accepted the Defendant's offer to accommodate her at the Property. When the Claimant moved into the Property she was wheelchair bound and was unable to walk; a previous medical report on the Claimant's housing file had indicated that she did have limited mobility and could use walking sticks. Soon after the Claimant accepted the offer of the Property as alternative temporary accommodation, she requested (through her Solicitors, Deighton Pierce Glynn, who have represented her throughout) a statutory review of its suitability. Detailed submissions on the suitability of the Property were made by the Claimant's Solicitors on 21 November 2014. They contended that:
i) The Property had not been sufficiently adapted for a wheelchair user. The kitchen cupboards were too high for the Claimant to reach, the windows were too high for her to open and the bathroom had not been fully adapted.
ii) The lift that occupied much of the Claimant's bedroom and the living room on the ground floor (as well as the furniture in the living room) meant that the space available for her to manoeuvre around was insufficient. It was also not possible for the Claimant to move in and out of all three bedrooms in her wheelchair, or to turn her wheelchair in any of them, which was not desirable as she had young children.
iii) The Claimant required a level access property. However, in default of that she asked the Defendant to consider adaptations to the kitchen and the reconfiguration of the lift at the Property.
In February 2015, the Property was assessed by an Occupational Therapist as part of the Defendant's review. The Occupational Therapist, who visited the Property and spoke to the Claimant, noted that the Claimant had told her that the Property was much better than being in ‘bed and breakfast’ accommodation and that the Claimant was happy to remain in it temporarily. In her report, she raised concerns about the Claimant being unable to reach the kitchen cupboards and slipping from the shower seat in the bathroom. It was also noted that the Claimant was unable to access the garden via the back door, due to the layout of the kitchen (although the Claimant did not wish to have a particular kitchen cupboard removed, which might have improved access to the back door) and that there was no upstairs toilet. The Occupational Therapist considered that the Property, although “not ideal” in meeting all the recommendations made in the Defendant's initial disability housing assessment, was “sufficient in the short term… until a more suitable property can be found.”
The Defendant wrote to the Claimant's Solicitors on 24 February 2015, stating that it was minded to decide that the Property remained suitable and giving its proposed reasons. The Defendant gave the Claimant an opportunity to comment on the proposed findings. On 23 April 2015, the Claimant's Solicitors responded. In that letter they raised an additional argument as to why the Property was not suitable, which was that there was no upstairs toilet and that the Claimant, due to difficulties with continence, was unable to reach the ground floor toilet, located in the bathroom, in time during the night. It was stated that the Claimant had experienced accidents, on an unspecified number of occasions, which she had found humiliating and distressing.
On 5 June 2015, the Defendant accepted that the Property was not suitable accommodation. The sole reason given for this decision by the Defendant was that the only bathroom at the Property was on a different floor from the Claimant's bedroom, which was contrary to one of the requirements that had been specified in the initial disability assessment that had been undertaken in February 2014. None of the other arguments raised by the Claimant's Solicitors were addressed in the Defendant's decision letter, although it is right to point out that they had been addressed in some detail (and rejected) in the Defendant's earlier ‘minded to’ letter of 24 February 2015. I accordingly infer that the sole and decisive reason for the Defendant's finding that the Property was not suitable accommodation was the issue of the location of the bathroom. The Defendant's letter of 5 June 2015 stated:
“In view of this, the Council will make another offer of accommodation.
Your client will be contacted once alternative, suitable accommodation has been identified…”
On 8 June, the Claimant's Solicitors asked whether the Claimant needed to take any action following the review decision, or whether she would be contacted by the Defendant; the Defendant's response on 10 June was that the Claimant would be contacted directly once suitable accommodation was available. There was apparently some delay in commencing the search for such accommodation during the latter part of 2015 when the Defendant was awaiting a report from its medical adviser. On 23 December 2015, the Defendant wrote to the Claimant stating that the report had been received and that it was “actively trying to source accommodation for the [Claimant's] family”.
On 7 March 2016, the Claimant's Solicitors wrote to the Defendant stating that no offer of suitable accommodation had been made and asking the Defendant to confirm the steps it had taken to find such accommodation for the Claimant. The Defendant did not respond to that letter; however, the Defendant did then offer the Property to the Claimant as permanent accommodation. The Claimant's...
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