6.12Manchester CC v Romano [2004] EWCA Civ 834, [2005] 1 WLR 2775
A possession order could be granted in favour of a local authority against a disabled secure tenant if the local authority believed it was justified in seeking possession to avoid endangering the health or safety of any neighbours and if it was reasonable in all the circumstances for the local authority to hold that opinionWednesbury unreasonableness:health and safety of neighbours, endangeringWednesbury unreasonableness:mental illnessWednesbury unreasonableness:reasonableness
Facts: Manchester obtained possession orders against two tenants on the grounds of neighbour nuisance. The tenants both suffered from a recognised mental illness and appealed on the basis that their eviction was in breach of the Disability Discrimination Act 1995.
Judgment: the Court of Appeal (Brooke and Jacob LJJ, Sir Martin Nourse) dismissed the appeals, holding that whilst seeking possession was subjecting a disabled tenant to ‘any other detriment’ within the meaning of section 22(3)(c) of the Disability Discrimination Act 1995, so that if the reason for such action related to the disability of the tenant it would be unlawful unless it could be justified pursuant to section 24(2) of the 1995 Act. When considering whether a landlord’s treatment of a disabled tenant was justified under section 24(3)(a) of the 1995 Act the court should ask, first, whether the landlord held the opinion that it was necessary to seek possession in order that the health of an individual person or persons would not be put at risk, and, secondly, whether that opinion was objectively justified by reference to the facts known to the landlord at the time he embarked on the alleged discriminatory treatment. If a tenant could prove that the landlord’s conduct in seeking possession amounted to unlawful discrimination that would be a relevant factor when the court was determining, pursuant to section 84(2)(a) of the Housing Act 1985, whether it was reasonable to make an order for possession. In both these cases Manchester had been justified in seeking a possession order so as to protect the health of neighbours:
69. In the present appeals, the council must prove that if it did not take this action someone’s health or safety would be endangered. It does not have to prove that that person’s health or safety has actually been damaged. The World Health Organisation has since 1948 adopted the following definition of the word ‘health’: ‘Health is a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity.’
70. If health is endangered, that state is put at risk. The statute does not use the words ‘seriously endangered’, and when interpreting the 1995 Act compatibly with the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms scheduled to the Human Rights Act 1998, it is necessary to bear in mind not only the Convention rights of the disabled person but also the Convention rights of his neighbours. It may be useful in this context to compare the evidence given by Mr Schofield, the owner-occupier of the house next door to Ms Romano, with the approach of the Grand Chamber of the European Court of Human Rights in Hatton v United Kingdom (2003) 37 EHRR 611.