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Night shelters
I’ve just lost a first tier tribunal on the grounds that a night shelter cannot be classed as a “home”. Bizarrely the judge decided that the building was a dwelling, but said that the fact that clients turned up each evening if they wished to do so and were admitted if not drunk and disorderly, leaving each morning without a guarantee or re-admittance meant that the place could not be treated as a home.
We are considering the upper tribunal on the grounds that there is a lot of material in the regulations about what is and is not a home and there is no mention of security of tenure. (indeed licences are specifically allowed, although in many cases licencees would have more security than night shelter residents) Further there has been such a history of the benefit system funding insecure accommodation for single homeless people that, if Parliament had wanted to exclude this type of housing there would have been regulations to that effect.
However I am very much aware of the implications of losing an upper tribunal case, since this would make night shelters across the country impossible. Can you see any flaws in my argument
Is this related to an earlier thread?
http://www.rightsnet.org.uk/forums/viewthread/1961/
Yes- and I used the arguments posted on the board in my further submission. Some of these were accepted by the judge, whose ruling was solely on the issue of lack of security
Yes- and I used the arguments posted on the board in my further submission. Some of these were accepted by the judge, whose ruling was solely on the issue of lack of security
Chris, is that the only reason for refusal? There must be more to it surely?
[ Edited: 2 Mar 2012 at 03:51 pm by Kevin D ]Yes it was. I used all the arguments suggested on the previous thread plus a number of others and we managed to deal with all the arguments except this one. To quote the statement of reasons “Even a hotel booking for one night might be sufficient if made in advance. Even that degree of security was not present in this case. Although, as it happens the appellant stayed overnight at the shelter two thirds of the time it was open he had no certainty of being accommodated and no security of tenure. I take the view that some security of tenure is necessary before it can be objectively said that a person occupies accommodation as his home.”
On the face it, this is a simple upper tribunal case, because I don’t think that this is what the law provides, but I’m very aware of the consequences of losing on this issue and I’m also concerned that the DWP policy section takes the same view and encouraged the LA to put forward this argument