Developed by CIH and a range of partners, the new tool - The Community Harm Statement - will enable landlords to highlight the harmful impact of ASB on a community, and not just the individual, when taking legal action and ensure evidence is presented to the court in a consistent manner. It gives a stronger voice to communities by helping ensure that the damage inflicted by ASB is properly voiced and listened to when landlords take legal action. It can also be used to support non-judicial actions, casework and partnership working.
Grainia Long, Chief Executive of CIH, said: “The Community Harm Statement is an industry leading document that will be useful for social landlords to adopt as part of their toolkit for tackling ASB. It has been designed to help social landlords when they take legal action on ASB to present evidence to the court in a consistent manner, and in a way that properly captures the impact not only on individuals but also the wider community. As such it is an opportunity to give communities a stronger voice in the judicial process.
“Anti social behaviour has such a detrimental affect on communities, the impact of last summer’s riots are testament to that, and until now the voice of the community hasn’t been put forward in the courts. We know the government is soon to announce new measures to deal with anti social behaviour and this document is the first of its kind to focus on communities and not just individuals.”
Helen Tucker concluded, “We’d like to thank the CIH for giving us the opportunity to contribute towards the development of this ASB tool. As a firm we’re committed to achieving social justice through the work we do with clients and partner organisations - this ASB tool will contribute to helping to secure justice for local communities who are suffering due to anti-social behaviour.”
To download a copy of the guidance notes for social landlords click here.
Residents are now unable to make applications to prohibit landlords from seeking to recover the cost of legal proceedings through the service charge on behalf of other residents, without consent.
Natalie Barbosa summarises some of the legal challenges facing fundraisers in the charity sector.
We hosted a breakfast roundtable with Insider Midlands magazine that had attendees from a range of organisations addressing housing needs in the Midlands. The discussion explored JVs in more detail.
The decision of the Court of Appeal in The Harpur Trust v Brazel & Unison has made clear that employers can no longer legally calculate part-time holiday based on 12.07% of hours worked over a year.
Social landlords are seeing a rising number of Equality Act defences to possession proceedings. A recent Court of Appeal decision helps shift the likelihood of such defences succeeding.
On 31 July, the consultation period ended on MHCLG’s proposals for reforming the building safety regulatory system set out in the 'Building a Safer Future' document. We have submitted our response.
For decades now, fewer and fewer services provided by local authorities have been delivered directly by them. However, over the last couple of years, there are signs that this tide is changing.
The Government commissioned an independent review of the Modern Slavery Act 2015 in July 2018. The outcome was published in May 2019 which highlighted areas for improvement.
In 2017, the NCVO commissioned a review of the tax reliefs available to charities. The brainchild of this review was published on 17 July 2019 in the form of the Charity Tax Commission report.
In 2014, the Charity Commission released its first guidance for charities on reporting serious incidents. The Commission has recently updated this guidance.
To receive invitations to our events, as well as information and articles on legal issues and sector developments that are of interest to you, please sign up to Newsroom.