Eviction of families from local authority, or housing association accommodation on conviction of any family member being involved in riot-related offences.

[Pan]

This has triggered a wide-ranging debate on the reasonableness of this measure. What we do know is that entire families are now liable to homelessness due to the actions of one person in the family. The tactic used to enable this is the commonly-applied clause to be of 'good behaviour'. This is designed to protect other tenants in the vicinity from anti-social behaviour. We know that approx. 70% of offenders here do not live in that vicinity. LAs DO NOT accept responsibility for abti-social behaviour in other boroughs.

The proposed actions are discriminatory against LA/HA tenants per se (as compared with owner-occupiers/private tenants, and will fall hardest on single parent mothers with sons who have offended recently.

Is it reasonable to ask MN to use their voice/influence to raise a public campaign against these measures before a case precedent is established that can be used by LA/HAs to assist in their evictions policy?

ok you have to look at LA's when they do this and what they have to gain.

The LA's and HA's will not just evict someone....cos they can evict someone.

They will use new powers, they will use a fast track court system where there is a benefit to them. this IME is likely to be where the tenant has a history. There is no benefit that i can see at this moment in time ....and if you point one out i will gladly and flagrantly back track..... for a LA or a HA to evict a tenan who pays the rent - whether that is through hb or not. and who has previously always been a good tenant.

now adverse publicity would almost certainly do it. so if the papers ran a piece on why wandsworth (for instance) didn't evict mr smith after his son wantanly smashed in a sports clothing store and stole £300 worth of desinger skipping ropes - that is something very likely to sway the powers that be. If this isn't likely to happen, if the housing industry press/national press aren't likley to pick on one partic organisation. if the regulators aren't going to do anything (which they won't) then its unlikley.

in the end this is about organisational reputation for council leaders and/or chief exec.

if chief exec doesn't give a shit - and they wont unless there is averse publicity, then the housing officer is highly unlikley to instigate procedings unless the perpetrator is known to them

Taps - Idon't know about FB. I have asked those in the know about twittering, though we surely can't be the only ones who find this disgusting.

I have posted most of thisafternoon, and gardened, and need to sleep. Tomorrow I am with dd for cooking lessons. She is 11 yo and thinks meals grow magically from empty plates. She has a shock coming..
So if anyone as the heart to bump this from time to time that would be appreciated. MNHQ say they will look at it on Monday.

If anyone posts that this is a bit 'previous' then it isn't really as first cases do often set the precedent. Night.

Someone remind me why we have a legal system and how long it has been established for, do we trust the law?

Have any of you actually looked at the teenagers section on Mn? And seen some of the awful things MN'ers teenagers do. And these are teenagers from loving families. And sometimes quite priveliged teenagers.

And with regards to the possible eviction - While the mother might (possibly, but with great difficulty as most BTL LL's mortgages don't allow it) find a private LL that is willing to accept HB (which isn't all that likely). Can someone please stick their hand above the parapet and tell me just where the FUCK someone in that situation would find two months worth of rent as a deposit?? And possibly more as some LA's are notoriously slow at getting HB claims up and running, and she would have to pay the full rent first and get the money back when she was paid her backpay of HB.

Now, forgive me if I'm wrong, say she kicks out the looting teenager, and just has to house herself and her 8yo DD. In my area a two bed house or flat is about £900pcm to privately rent. Soooo the Mum, who may genuinely be having trouble PHYSICALLY controlling an adult sized 17/18yo child, will have to find AT LEAST £1,800 just to keep a roof over her 8yo's head. And maybe more. And surely rents in London (to keep her DD near her school / friends / family etc), are considerably dearer than my area? And how the hell does a LP with no job due to lack of jobs in local area find THAT sort of money? I bloody couldn't. How many of you could?

Are you MN'ers that are not on board for this petition SERIOUSLY saying that that is a right or fair situation for this mother and daughter to be in? Would YOU be able to physically restrain a 17/18yo male, when you are alone, to stop him from leaving the house? Do you all believe that the right amount of hugs and organic food will stop your PFB's from ever acting like this? If so, I suggest you all with younger dc's take a good look through the old threads in the teenagers section on here, and bloody brace yourselves.

yes Custardo - the notion of 'reputation' has shifted somewhat - Chief Execs will be under a political pressure to press for eviction - the view of the Housing Officer is a bit redundant.

i thought i saw an article where someone has been evicted already

shall go and find.

i shall post this on fb, although i am still unsure as to which side of the fence i am actually on.

i really want someone to persuade me that pan is right, i want to be on that side i really do, but im not wholly convinced

nope i'm mistaken it was the eviction notice - for the wandsworth case

Said as a mother of a 13.5yo DD who has asd and can't understand what happened in the riots, "It must have been OK because the police were standing there watching them, the police would have arrested them if it was naughty"

Meanwhile, DS1 (9.4yo, NT) is discussing what HE feels are the correct punishments for the looters.

taps - the law is pretty clear in letter, and largely works.

An analogy is the job of a sports referee. It's his/her job to interpret the laws of the game. I am wishing MN to be clear that the interpretation should not be discriminatory against families, and as likely to be the case, against single mums.
night again.

see the rest of the thread custardo. Up to you.

in what way will there be pressure on chief execs to evict?

the view of the H/O isn't redundant as it is they who will instigate action or ...not.

posted on fb btw

LAs are not going to suddently start to try to apply for eviction orders wholesale, after all they have to pick up those who they evict, even if it is as intentionally homeless.

There may be political pressure to serve an NSP but that makes no difference if there is not any evidence on which to base the case. ASB cases are expensive and lengthy, if defended, no authority is going to waste resources (if they have them) to pursue cases that are unwinnable in court.

Some LAs like to look politically tough but ultimately the noises made by them, are usually just noises, not much else.

I'd be happy to sign up for this.

Can't believe how anyone can think this is a good idea.

Hadn't seen anything about this but I'm definitely in support.

The actions were wrong but making more families homeless is hardly going to help matters. Strange that the gov didn't target the parents of those involved in violence re: the student riots in the same manner, isn't it?

Don't have time to read thread but:

Can I add my support? I pay my taxes so people can have a roof over their heads. It is a basic right not a 'privilege' as David Davis called it on QT.

I don't care what these people hAve done, food and shelter is the least they can expect in a civilised country.

I do not pay taxes for MPs to have second homes, new kit hens, multiple laptops, or pay for their offspring to have a summer job.

This eviction business is disproportionate. If they catch the people who burnt down homes and businesses they should throw the book at them for arson. Same with criminal damage. But evict their parents and siblings? What have we come to?

Wandsworth may be the first council to do this but other councils are planning to follow suit, you can find the references on google. Now in some cases I can see why they may wish to do this, I don't have a lot of sympathy for the mother of the 12 year old caught stealing wine, father is in prison and the mother was swearing at reporters outside the court. BUT I need to be convinced this is more than knee jerk over-reaction and that an innocent child is not suffering for a single mistake by an adult brother. I don't know if we can rely on the courts to be sensible because I don't know what power they have if the council has a legal right to do this.

I've never lived in council property, don't know about tenant rights and when I tried to look at the act someone referred to up the thread it talked about closing property for 6 months. I don't think that is the relevant law, anyone with experience of housing law/CAB around? I'm too busy today to look.

By the way, has it occurred to anyone that the reason some parents don't turn up to court to support their 10 to 17 year olds who have been arrested is that they don't condone their behaviour

I see the refusal to attend court as the parents saying they don't give a damn, actually! The not giving a damn is what led the kids to do this in the first place.

I'm in. Being found guilty by association is the start of a very slippery slope.
There are some bad parents out there.
There are some really badly-behaved children/teens out there.
The two don't necessarily go hand in hand.

Well said Loudlass and NormanTebbit.

Am posting in support of the OP.

as a director of a housing association I am incredibly glad that there were no riots in Wales as it is a difficult situation and one that i don't think i can comment further on without the full facts of the particular case.

Social housing in London is a very valuable comodity- far more so than in other areas of the uk (for example we have never had a case of illegal subletting in our association, whereas most london organisations will have a dedicated team of investigators to deal with the problem). So I guess london RSL's are under more pressure to ensure that they are seen to be using the resources for the benefit of the community and providing the best value service.

Can i just clarify one point to posters, as soon as social housing is mentioned on mn, people always assume that living in a council house or housing association house means that the family has no earned income and lives on benefits. In the majority of cases this is not true, we have a huge number of really hard working tenants who have a better standard of living by paying their rent to a housing association rather than lining the pockets of a private landlord. They gain more security of tenure and a guarantee that their home will be maintained to a minimum standard.

I am a great champion of affordable housing, i see cases on a weekly basis of families improving their quality of life. Often at the point of allocation a family may be at it's lowest (increasingly we are finding two parent families with small children are living in temporary accomodation because dad has lost his job through redundancy, the mortgage can't be paid etc etc) Once that family is provided with a good quality safe home, it is normal for that family to flourish within the first 6 months of a tenancy, employement is resumed, stress levels are lower as the financial expectations are often less and the family have enough space to grow together. PLEASE do not judge social housing tenants, I can guarantee that i know a few who will be better educationally qualified than most of the posters on here, and a handful who's income would make a few of you weep- these are the very minority of tenants, the majority are hard working people employed in sectors which hold together the infrastructure of out country and yet pay very little.

On the subject of supporting the campaign, I'm with custy! but with more facts and info...

reallywoundup - the facts and info are pretty plain. Councils are letting it be known they will move to evict the families where anyone has commited an offence during the riots. This is above and beyond their normal practice.

If you mean the facts about this particular Wandsworth case then no, not all the facts are known. But what I am asking via this thread isn't predicated on that case nor it's outcome. It's that decisions to seek eviction are not based purely on the prescence of a riot-related offence.

I would ask you then, would your housing association seek to evict a family in these circumstances?

all councils? why - link please

reallywoundup - you're my hero (today only)

I'm with you Pan. I've been feeling a bit of a lone voice on here over the last week so good to know there are other people who think that we have to be very careful in condoning knee jerk reactions with long term consequences.

I got really cross hearing the panellists on Question Time yesterday calling social housing subsidised.

Custardo i didn't say all councils, so there isn't a link. But from Wandsworth's various statements and, from yesterday at least about 6 others including Manchester City Council have said they will follow suit and seek to evict on the presence of any riot-related offence.