High Court upholds decisions by councils not to provide family with housing and subsistence support

Two London boroughs acted correctly when they made assessments that led them to decide not to provide a family with accommodation and subsistence under section 17 of the Children Act 1989.

Enfield decided not to make such provision on 22 November 2018 and neighbouring Haringey reached the same conclusion the same day. Children SN, PN and CN challenged these decisions in the High Court through their mother SI (SN, PN and CN, R (on the application of) v London Borough of Enfield London Borough of Haringey [2019] EWHC 793 (Admin)

Yip J granted interim relief on 28 November 2018, ordering Enfield to continue providing accommodation and subsistence support with Haringey meeting half the cost.

Anne Whyte QC, sitting as a deputy high court judge, noted SI is Nigerian and came to the UK in 2010 on a visitor's visa. She does not currently have leave to remain and has no recourse to public funds. She and her children lived at various addresses in Haringey and later stayed with friends in Enfield.

Enfield made a multi agency safeguarding hub referral to Haringey on 6 November 2018 in which it assessed the danger of the family being rendered homeless and destitute as 7 out of 10.

The judge said: “Haringey promptly denied any obligation.” But she said the assessment noted that there was insufficient evidence of SI living in Enfield and noted that the GP, relevant school and health visiting team were all in Haringey.

SI did not provide those conducting the assessment with photographs or documents showing any sort of connection with the address at which she claimed to have lived in Enfield or evidence of financial transactions near the premises.

Ms Whyte concluded: “It is correct that physical presence was cited as a reason for deciding that Enfield should not have responsibility for the claimants.

“That was an error of law, as Enfield now concedes. It is quite clear however from those extracts that SI's account significantly informed the social workers' conclusion that the claimants were not children in need for the purpose of the statutory assessment. This is one of those cases, I find, where it is obvious from their reasoning, read as a whole, that the decision would have been the same notwithstanding the error about physical presence. The error of law does not justify quashing the assessment.”

She rejected submissions that the assessment was rushed or inadequate and said it was “conducted in good faith and that reasonable enquiries were made with sufficient diligence” and noted that while SI plainly had a source of income she did not satisfactorily explain its nature.