Council threatened with Judicial Review over sheltered housing cuts

News reaches us that the Council has been threatened with legal action and the potential of Judicial Review into its proposals to arbitrarily close a number of old peoples home, beginning with Richard Neve House.

In recent weeks we've learned that the Council has been sending out letters to sheltered accommodation residents across the borough using phrases such as "we want to assure you you're accommodation will not be closing at this time" and then inviting them to consultation.

The consultation meetings from what we've been told consists of the Council essentially telling elderly residents that it is too skint to make their homes meet the "Decent Homes2 standards so they plan to change their use and kick the old people out.

This was until last week where it emerged that residents of Richard Neve House have got a lawyer involved who threatened the Council with Judicial Review. The result was that the Council backed down and agreed to further consultation, whilst of course holding the line that a review would "fail". If they're so sure why back down?