ROOF Blog

Young people housed by local authorities are entitled to ‘more than a roof over their heads’, a ruling by the House of Lords established. The Law Lords judged that councils have a duty of care to assess the wider needs of 16- and 17-year-olds coming to them following family breakdown or because they are refugees. Their judgment clarified whether young people asking local authorities for accommodation should be dealt with by housing departments, or children’s services, as they finally ruled. Solicitors have called the judgment a ‘huge step forward for children’s rights and required councils to rethink services’.

A House of Commons’ select committee has warned that the state is failing in its duty to act as a parent to children in care by not protecting them from sexual exploitation, homelessness and crime. In its report the children, schools and family committee calls for a radical overhaul of the system to ensure that the most vulnerable children get the services they require. It says that concerns for the happiness and welfare of the 60,000 children in care should be at the heart of the system and that government is ‘too timid’ in demanding that health services and the criminal justice and asylum systems give special consideration to looked-after children.

A couple who were terrorised by a gang had their £100,000 award for damages taken away by appeal judges, who ruled that although they had ‘every sympathy’ for the family, the London borough of Hounslow had no duty of care towards them. The couple, who have learning disabilities, had help from the council’s social services department, but the lower court decided that the council should have realised that the couple were in imminent danger and should have been moved elsewhere. Hounslow argued that duty of care was owed only to children, and the appeal court agreed.

The House of Lords has ruled that social landlords to not have a duty of care to their tenants, after an elderly man was murdered by his neighbour. The man’s family took the case to the Lords in an attempt to prove that Glasgow council should have done more to protect the man, who was attacked after complaining to the council about the defendant’s behaviour. The Lords ruled that the council did not have a duty of care in such circumstances because relationship between the council and the tenant wasn’t close.