England and Wales Court of Appeal (Civil Division) Decisions

IN THE SUPREME COURT OF JUDICATURE
COURT OF APPEAL (CIVIL DIVISION)
ON APPEAL FROM WANDSWORTH COUNTY COURT
(MR RECORDER ELVIDGE)

		Royal Courts of Justice Strand London WC2 Thursday, 12th September 2002

Thursday, 12th September 2002

1. LORD JUSTICE LONGMORE: The application before me today by Miss Campbell arises on a second review by a local housing authority, the London Borough of Richmond, of the question whether accommodation offered to Miss Campbell at 75 Redesdale Gardens SW5 was suitable accommodation. The actual decision of Mr Recorder Elvidge, which Miss Campbell seeks permission to appeal, was to quash the decision under review because the person making the decision (which in fact was the second time a decision on review had been made) had involved himself in the securing of the property; so he decided there would have to be another review. In any event he quashed the review that had taken place, but he was requested, as I understand it by both parties, to consider the legal merits of the matter and say whether the considerations advanced by the Council in making their decision were relevant and whether it could be said that there was any error of law in the way that the borough had proceeded. He decided as an assistance to the parties that, provided the decision had been procedurally secure, it could not in fact be attacked on the basis that there was an error of law in the review. The error of law suggested was that the decision was an unreasonable decision in the sense of being so unreasonable that no reasonable council ought to have offered the accommodation to Miss Campbell.
2. The learned recorder, having decided as he did, the question now is whether there is a realistic chance of the Court of Appeal being persuaded to take a different view. It is a second appeal, and, as was decided in Azimi v London Borough of Newham [2001] 33 HLR 569, that means that the Court of Appeal cannot give permission unless it considers the appeal would raise an important point of principle or practice, or there is some other compelling reason for the Court of Appeal to hear it.
3. Miss Campbell has appeared before me today and has put her arguments extremely attractively. She says that there are three areas of controversy; firstly, whether it was suitable accommodation in respect of the nursery services available for her son to go to nursery school; secondly, in the light of the fact that a washing machine, and perhaps also a tumble drier, were essential for her circumstances and the fact that one was not there and, as she submits, there was no space for one, meant that the offer of accommodation was unreasonable; and thirdly - and this is where she puts her greatest emphasis - whether the garden was suitable for a child, it being a front garden, the back garden only being available to the other flat of the house, and, being a front garden which abutted on to the road outside. She has shown me photographs which show that the wall is in fact very low and there would be an obvious risk of a child being able to climb over.
4. Those matters about which Miss Campbell understandably feels very strongly I have to say are matters of fact and not matters of law. It is a case which cannot on any view be said to raise an important point of principle or practice. The question is just whether the Council were in error of law when they reviewed the offer of this accommodation to Miss Campbell; so it boils down to whether there is a compelling reason for the Court of Appeal to hear it. I fear that there is no such compelling reason because it is very difficult to see how the judge below erred in any way in his approach to the matter. The question, as he said, was whether it was an offer which was so unreasonable that no reasonable Council would have made it. Obviously it was not ideal. Nevertheless, it was primarily for the Council to decide on review whether the accommodation was suitable. The judge carefully considered the review that had taken place and I have to say that there is no prospect that the Court of Appeal would take a different view.
5. In those circumstances there is no compelling reason for an appeal to take place.
(Application dismissed; no order for costs).