You generally have to be either homeless or threatened with homelessness to have any hope of obtaining local authority housing. In one case, however, that position led to apparent absurdity when a mother of a disabled son was informed by a judge that her chances might be improved if she stopped paying her rent.
The mother cared full time for her adult son and was thus unable to work. She was living in private accommodation and was struggling to pay her rent. The local authority had, however, refused to put her on its housing waiting list on the basis that she had a roof over her head and was not under threat of homelessness.
The judge rejected the woman’s judicial review challenge to the council’s refusal on the basis that it had made no error of law. However, she told the woman that, if she ceased paying her rent on the basis that she could not afford it, her landlord would be likely to take possession proceedings against her. At that point, the local authority would have a statutory duty to consider her homelessness application.