Council help please, urgent!

vivatifosi

I'm with blue-monkey on this one, being on DLA/having some sort of medical need should help.

My aunt is on DLA and the council told her they wouldn't do anything, so we contacted all the local housing trusts. We managed to get her a one bed gf flat through them as she cannot climb stairs and needed a disabled conversion. The council had told us that they choose who to house and tell the trusts who to house so we couldn't get anything without going through them first, then the local housing association came up with something. I think if you have special circumstances they may have more latitude. Worth a try?

blue_monkey_2

Oh and with her being on IB it will make all the difference so make sure she gets into the right band now as she will be unable to secure her own property. Do not wait to contact the MP, do that now http://www.johnrandallmp.com/ Mine tends to answer in the evenings.

Also note there is an open surgery on 4th April in the evening in Uxbridge, are you able to get her there? if not mail anyway, now and explain everything that you can, and get him involved http://www.conservatives.com/tile.do?def=people.person.page&personID=4564 he is conservative, seems you might have no trouble at all then!! tell them that she might have trouble attending a surgery because of her problems too.

the more info the better, I have 2 counsillors and 1 MP on my case, I ave letters here that tell me they will house me when i have a date for eviction that they sent to the MP, just wondering how they are going to wiggle out of that tbh when they can't even fix us an appointment!!

All the better if she has voted the Tory Candidate in (I am sure they know!) because you can give it the blah, blah, supported tory in the last election and I really need help.....

Good luck!! Please keep us informed on how it is going, OK.

squinty

Hello,

I've looked back at the original post, and suspect there are 2 issues here.

The first issue is about the type/size of property. Yesterday the rules for Housing Benefit changed. This is now called Local Housing Allowance, and the benefits section should pay the 'average' cost of an appropriately sized property for the family. My understanding is that your sister should be able to get sufficient rent for a one bed flat - so if your sister takes a private rented property the council cannot insist that she takes a bedsit.

The second issues is about priority for housing. It looks lke your sister is being treated as a normal housing applicant - however the council may be able to treat her as a homeless person (the shelter website has an excellent guide about homelessness). It may be an idea for your sister/you /support worker getting in touch with the council and INSISTING on a homlessness interview. If she is found to be vulnerable and unintentionally homeless the council have a statutory duty to assist. Be aware that in deciding in a person is vulnerable many authorities use an independent medical expert and will make their decsion only on the evidence submitted - make sure that you have a good 'pack' of evidence, from medical experts (detail of the disability) and from your sister / support worker (details of how the disability impacts on her live and needs for accommodation)

Also make sure she has informaion that clearly shows the date she must leave the property - for example a court order or eviction notice. Some authorities will not treat people as potentially homeless until 28 days before it happens.

Good luck.

Squinty


PS - blue_monkey - some of us who work in social housing work really hard to try and resolve a whole range of difficult and messy issues. I'd much rather work directly with a client than via a councillor or MP. The real problem is that demand outstrips supply (and is getting worse)

MrsE_2

moneysavingmumofone wrote: »

Thanks for your help.
She currently lives in the borough of hillingdon. If you found a flat for £500 a month there that'd be very cheap! Even in slough where i live you'd be lucky to find one for that.
She wouldnt be able to afford storage, she barely scrapes by as it is. Last time she was in the hostel they let her store her stuff in their garage. When she went to get it out they'd 'lost' her bed and dining table? Not easy things to lose:rolleyes:
She's been to the cab but they werent much help:o

Have you asked her support worker about the council paying for proper storage.

There is a charity that helps with housing SHELTER contact them.

Are there any charities or groups for the disability your sister has.

If she does go into a hostel will be have a better chance of securing more longterm council accomadation than renting privately again?

blue_monkey_2

Hi Squinty,

Some good advice for the OP.

In regard to your comment I wish I had you looking after us. The council have known since November that it was coming to this, I called them 3 weeks ago and said that we was up in court this date (MP has already informed them too) and they simply told me to call them back when we had a date. Now we do, 14 days today. They have not even bothered caling me back to arrange a meeting with a 'homeless officer' who is the same person I spoke to back in November many times and then 3 weeks ago too. At the same time they messed us around and do not give us the correct number of points, thus it meaning we could well miss out on the housing they were allocating prior to CBL, now they do not deal with it but the Choiced Based Lettings does. It is very frustrating getting pushed from one person to another time and time again as this has been 5 months in the offing and they leave us until we have 14 days left - and even then they have not bothered getting back to me to tell me when they can make an appointment for me to see a homeless officer. Just what is expected of us I do not know, what happens in the 14 days, where do we go? Do the bailiffs turn up and turf us out, what happens to our furniture? Do they toss it into the street? No-one will tell us anything but they will tell the MP, if it takes for him to be a go between then so be it as they are not taking any notice of us. I do understand about demand outstripping supply but what happens when we have nowhere? I would at least like some explaination but no-one even offers us that and with being told that you have to leave in 14 days (which I really did expect to be 2 months if I am honest, too blase about it all I guess). We are not youngers BTW but I am 37 and hubby 38 with him working, I had to close my business because our long term let is being sold, just having a bad run of luck over the last 3 years and this is the tip of the iceburg (hopefully) but this is it for us, we cannot even contemplate private housing because our our financials. All the agents state no HB, the houses cost £1000 month to rent as we live in the Home Counties, my son gets assistance at school because of his AS but is not statmented and while I am prepared to travel I can't move out of the district else we lose the main bulk of our points with those being local ones. It's just stress on top of stress.

moneysavingmumofone

blue_monkey wrote: »

Oh and with her being on IB it will make all the difference so make sure she gets into the right band now as she will be unable to secure her own property. Do not wait to contact the MP, do that now http://www.johnrandallmp.com/ Mine tends to answer in the evenings.

Also note there is an open surgery on 4th April in the evening in Uxbridge, are you able to get her there? if not mail anyway, now and explain everything that you can, and get him involved http://www.conservatives.com/tile.do?def=people.person.page&personID=4564 he is conservative, seems you might have no trouble at all then!! tell them that she might have trouble attending a surgery because of her problems too.

the more info the better, I have 2 counsillors and 1 MP on my case, I ave letters here that tell me they will house me when i have a date for eviction that they sent to the MP, just wondering how they are going to wiggle out of that tbh when they can't even fix us an appointment!!

All the better if she has voted the Tory Candidate in (I am sure they know!) because you can give it the blah, blah, supported tory in the last election and I really need help.....

Good luck!! Please keep us informed on how it is going, OK.

Didnt see this until today. (am terrible for forgetting about threads ive started sorry:o ) Would probably have been able to go too:rolleyes: Thankyou though x

moneysavingmumofone

squinty wrote: »

Hello,

I've looked back at the original post, and suspect there are 2 issues here.

The first issue is about the type/size of property. Yesterday the rules for Housing Benefit changed. This is now called Local Housing Allowance, and the benefits section should pay the 'average' cost of an appropriately sized property for the family. My understanding is that your sister should be able to get sufficient rent for a one bed flat - so if your sister takes a private rented property the council cannot insist that she takes a bedsit.

The second issues is about priority for housing. It looks lke your sister is being treated as a normal housing applicant - however the council may be able to treat her as a homeless person (the shelter website has an excellent guide about homelessness). It may be an idea for your sister/you /support worker getting in touch with the council and INSISTING on a homlessness interview. If she is found to be vulnerable and unintentionally homeless the council have a statutory duty to assist. Be aware that in deciding in a person is vulnerable many authorities use an independent medical expert and will make their decsion only on the evidence submitted - make sure that you have a good 'pack' of evidence, from medical experts (detail of the disability) and from your sister / support worker (details of how the disability impacts on her live and needs for accommodation)

Also make sure she has informaion that clearly shows the date she must leave the property - for example a court order or eviction notice. Some authorities will not treat people as potentially homeless until 28 days before it happens.

Good luck.

Squinty


PS - blue_monkey - some of us who work in social housing work really hard to try and resolve a whole range of difficult and messy issues. I'd much rather work directly with a client than via a councillor or MP. The real problem is that demand outstrips supply (and is getting worse)

Thankyou for your help She has already gone way past the date she was supposed to be out.:o

moneysavingmumofone

MrsE wrote: »

Have you asked her support worker about the council paying for proper storage.

There is a charity that helps with housing SHELTER contact them.

Are there any charities or groups for the disability your sister has.

If she does go into a hostel will be have a better chance of securing more longterm council accomadation than renting privately again?

I dont think there are any groups/charities. Ive never spoken to her support worker but ill get my sister to ask about storage.
I dont think she'd have a better chance as shes been in a hostel twice before and both times had to go into private again.

moneysavingmumofone

How is your situation blue_monkey?
The council are still insisting my sister can only have a studio flat and she still cant find one!

PasturesNew

Doing a search of Hillingdon on the Rent Service website (I have no idea what these areas mean at all as I don't know London, assuming it is London)


Search results for Local Authority Hillingdon shown in £'s per week
BRMA IDBRMA
1 Bed Self Contained
South West Herts 150.00
West London 207.69
North West London 173.08

So assuming she is over 25 she would get from £645-893/month for rent.

Going to rightmove, doing a search for renting in Hillingdon, I found these:

Studio £500 http://www.rightmove.co.uk/viewdetails-17252011.rsp?pa_n=3&tr_t=rent

Studio £525 http://www.rightmove.co.uk/viewdetails-20499206.rsp?pa_n=4&tr_t=rent

Studio £525 http://www.rightmove.co.uk/viewdetails-7294057.rsp?pa_n=4&tr_t=rent

Now, maybe my zero knowledge of the geography is out.
Or maybe she's under 25.
But the LHA allowable seems very doable within the LHA ranges it would appear she'd get.

And this ground floor studio has its own entrance and the rent includes all bills. Bargain
http://www.rightmove.co.uk/viewdetails-20574413.rsp?pa_n=4&tr_t=rent

Or what about a whole house for £695? http://www.rightmove.co.uk/viewdetails-564056.rsp?pa_n=9&tr_t=rent