Housing – Homeless person – Good faith – Appellant vacating accommodation at demand of private landlord – Whether appellant becoming intentionally homeless – Whether appellant acting in good faith – Appeal allowed
The appellant entered into a tenancy agreement with a private landlord that was expressed to be for one year from May 2006. Several weeks before the expiry date, the landlord informed the appellant that the tenancy would not be extended and that she was required to leave by the end of May 2007. The appellant visited a local advice centre and was told that she would have to go to the homeless persons unit, which would find her temporary accommodation. However, she did not take that advice. She was allowed to remain in her accommodation a further six months, after which the landlord asked her to vacate.
The appellant believed that she was obliged to leave and did so; she was not aware that the landlord was not entitled to possession without a court order. She became homeless and required assistance, but the respondent local authority refused to provide her with more than temporary accommodation on the basis that she had become intentionally homeless.
Section 191 of the Housing Act 1996 provided that a person became intentionally homeless if he deliberately did or failed to do anything in consequence of which he ceased to occupy available accommodation that he could reasonably have continued to occupy. An act or omission in good faith on the part of a person who was unaware of any relevant fact was not to be treated as deliberate: see section 191(2).
An issue arose as to whether the appellant had become intentionally homeless even though she had been unaware of a relevant fact under section 191(2) in that she had not known that she was not obliged to vacate her accommodation at the landlord’s request. The respondents contended that the appellant had not acted in good faith because the scope of good faith was not limited to dishonesty, but included wilful ignorance, manipulation and ignorance.
The county court held that the respondents had not erred in law in treating the appellant as being intentionally homeless as she need not have left when she did. The appellant appealed on the question as to whether she had acted in good faith under section 191(2).
Held: The appeal was allowed.
The respondents had been wrong in law in concluding that the appellant should be treated as being intentionally homeless.
Her ignorance of the fact that she enjoyed security of tenure, in the sense that she could not be required to leave without a court order, meant that she was unaware of a relevant fact, so that the condition for the possible application of section 191(2) was satisfied. Moreover, the act of relinquishing her accommodation had been done in good faith: O’Connor v Kensington and Chelsea Royal London Borough Council [2004] EWCA Civ 394; [2004] HLR 37 followed, R v Hammersmith and Fulham London Borough Council, ex parte Lusi (1991) 23 HLR 260 considered.
Although the appellant’s failure to visit the homeless persons unit could be said to be foolish or imprudent, it could not be categorised as not being in “good faith” for the purposes of section 191(2). “Good faith” carried a connotation of impropriety, or misuse or abuse of the legislation. The concept was aimed at protecting local housing authorities from finding that they owed the full duty under the 1996 Act to a person who, despite some relevant ignorance, ought to be regarded as being intentionally homeless.
Matthew Hutchings (instructed by Hallam-Peel & Co) appeared for the appellant; Donald Broatch (instructed by the legal department of Southwark London Borough Council) appeared for the respondents.
Eileen O’Grady, barrister
