Intentional Homelessness - Behaviour Matters

Local authorities deal with many cases of intentional homelessness each year. A recent case provides useful guidance on the approach of the courts when a claim of intentional homelessness is founded on everyday behaviour rather than a specific action of the homeless person.

It involved a young man with significant behaviour problems who lived with his disabled mother. When she found she could no longer control him, she ordered him to move out. He then moved in with his sister, but after ten months she also decided she could not cope with him.

The man asked Southwark London Borough Council to house him. The Council took the view that since his homelessness arose because of his bad behaviour, it was intentional homelessness. His mother would have continued to provide housing for him if his behaviour had not been unacceptable. That it continued to be so was his choice and therefore his homelessness was intentional.

The man appealed against the Council’s decision and, on appeal, the court ordered Southwark to accommodate him, judging that the Council had undertaken no detailed enquiry concerning his relationship with his mother and, in particular, had not ascertained whether this might already have broken down. Southwark appealed to the Court of Appeal.

In the view of the Court of Appeal, all circumstances had to be taken into account when determining whether a person had made himself intentionally homeless. In this case, the man had been required to leave his family home because of his bad behaviour. The difference between expected behaviour in a family context as opposed to when one is a tenant was significant as when one lives with other people, it is essential that they are shown proper respect. Secondly, the mother’s requests regarding the standard of behaviour she expected of her son were not unreasonable and she was willing to have him back if he behaved reasonably.

Once an application for housing had been made, the authority was required to make proper enquiries, but its failure to make further enquiries could not be challenged as a matter of public policy unless that failure was irrational or perverse. In this case, it was neither. Accordingly the Council’s decision that the homelessness was intentional was upheld.