Din test of homelessness upheld

The Court of Appeal has rejected an attempt to overturn the current law on intentional homelessness, ruling that the date a person moves out of reasonable accommodation is the relevant date regardless of what may happen after.

In Haile v London Borough of Waltham Forest [2014] EWCA Civ 792, the Court held that a woman, Ms Haile, who left a bedsit in a hostel due to “unpleasant smells” in October 2011 made herself intentionally homeless, regardless of the fact she was pregnant at the time and would have had to leave in February 2012, when she gave birth to her daughter. Only one person was allowed to occupy the room.

The council did not accept that the bad smells in the room made it unreasonable for Ms Haile to continue to live there. However, it has allowed Ms Haile to continue to live in temporary accommodation which she moved into in December 2011. 

The Court upheld the House of Lords decision, Din v Wandsworth London Borough Council [1983] 1 AC 657, in which the Lords held by a 3-2 majority that the relevant date for determining intentionality was the date when the person left the accommodation. Delivering the lead judgment, Lord Justice Jackson said Din “requires the decision maker to consider whether homelessness was ‘intentional’ at the date when the appellant quit her accommodation, not at the date of the council's decision”.

Tayyabah Ahmed, housing solicitor at Hackney Community Law Centre, which represented Ms Haile, says: “Baroness Hale expressly considered in the case of Birmingham City Council v Ali; Moran v Manchester City Council (Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government and another intervening) [2009] UKHL 36 that ‘there may come a case in which we should re-examine the circumstances in which a finding of intentional homelessness ceases to colour all future decision under the Act’. 

“The case of Haile is that case, especially since one of its potential benefits for a local authority is to be able to reach a proper decision at the date of the decision or the review rather than encouraging repeat applications. For the sake of consistency in the law, we are seeking an extension on funding as there are similar cases, and the answer does lie with the Supreme Court.”