R (CARMEN CASTRO GUALLICHICO) v THE LONDON BOROUGH OF SOUTHWARK [2026] EWHC 1665 (Admin)
Tina Conlan appeared for the London Borough of Southwark in this claim for judicial review against the operation of the direct offer procedure within their allocations policy. The claim was dismissed on all grounds by Jonathan Richards, sitting as a Deputy Judge of the High Court.
The case concerned the general duty of transparency and is a helpful illustration of the level of detail required in an allocations policy.
The claimant advanced three grounds.
She claimed that direct offers were required to be made in accordance with the date an applicant had been added to the direct offer list. The Court disagreed, finding:
“49. Looking at the scheme as a whole, I am satisfied that housing allocation is intended to and does operate principally by way of CBL. The direct offers list is an additional, discretionary route in cases of urgency. There are a variety of reasons, as set out, why a case might be considered urgent, which are not readily comparable. Priority for a direct offer is set based on the date a household has been agreed for a direct offer but, depending on the urgency of a case, a relevant senior officer may make a decision to enhance the priority for a direct offer. Indeed, it is clear from the correspondence that enhanced priority has been given to a number of households to whom direct offers of 4 and 5-bedroomed properties have been made, enabling them to be made offers prior to the Claimant. There will also be a number of questions as to the suitability to a household of the property subject to a direct offer.
50. That is how the scheme is stated to work and I do not find that there has been any breach of that procedure in this case.”
The claimant also argued that the direct offer process lacked transparency. Applying R (Lynch) v Lambeth LBC [2006] EWHC 2737 (Admin); [2007] HLR 14 and R (Babakandi) v Westminster CC [2011] EWHC 1756 (Admin); [2011] ACD 99 the Court found that LB Southwark had provided sufficient detail in their allocations policy as to how direct offers would be made:
“64. In all the circumstances, while I can understand the Claimant’s wish for more detailed information about how the Defendant’s scheme will be operated, I do not consider that the failure to provide such information renders the scheme unlawful. Inevitably, there will be many factors relevant to the difficult decisions that the Defendant has to make in relation to the allocation of a limited housing stock to a large number of applicants. It is clear that the Defendant needs to retain discretion as to their decisions. In all the circumstances, this ground fails.”
The Court also held that Southwark had, through their equality impact assessment and ongoing monitoring, had requisite due regard to the public sector equality duty (Equality Act 2010, s149). The claimant had not, moreover, established that disabled persons were disadvantaged by the operation of the direct offers procedure.
Permission to appeal the dismissal of ground 2 was refused.