Nearly Legal - Mohamed v LB Hounslow - Quashing or varying a review decision – Unsuitable Accommodation

The appellant’s son had special needs such. An Occupational Therapist had said that it was dangerous for him. The council maintained that the son’s needs were such that no property could really suitable but that this one could be treated as suitable because the landlord could carry out adaptations and the son could be supervised.

It was held that:-

• The council could not rely on proposed adaptations being carried out to make the property suitable if where they were not “certain, binding and enforceable” as had been held in the Court of Appeal Case of Boreh v Ealing [2008] EWCA Civ 1176
• The council has not properly applied the requirements of the Children Act 2004 or the Public Sector Equality Duty
• The council had acted irrationally by failing to properly consider the danger highlighted by the Occupational Therapist. The judge stated that a challenge based on irrationality presents a high hurdle but addeded “ However, to demonstrate irrationality does not mean that a person must show “a decision so bizarre that its author must be regarded as temporarily unhinged”, rather “it means a decision which does not add up in which…there is an error of reasoning which robs the decision of logic.” (R v Parliamentary Commissioner for Administration ex p Balchin [1997] JPL 197).”

MS-HILAL-HAJI-MOHAMED-APPROVED-JUDGMENT-28-APRIL-2025.pdf