NSP relying on Ground 8 (mandatory rent arrears ground); section 8(2) allowed particulars, as well as grounds, to be amended with leave
The defendant was an assured tenant. After failure by the local authority to pay housing benefit, the landlords brought possession proceedings relying on rent arrears, including the mandatory ground in Housing Act 1988 Sch 2 Ground 8. A notice, purporting to comply with Housing Act 1988 s8, was served before the issue of proceedings, stating as particulars of the arrears, ‘At a meeting between the landlord and tenant on 24 July 1994 the arrears were agreed at £103.29 … Since that date no payments of rent have been made.’ No figure for the arrears at the date of the notice was given.
The Court of Appeal held that a notice from a landlord to a tenant complies with Housing Act 1988 s8 provided that:
… it is made clear … that more than three months’ rent is at the date of that notice unpaid and due and provided also that in some way or other that notice makes it clear either how much, or how the tenant can ascertain how much, is alleged to be due.
It is not necessary for the notice to contain a schedule of the arrears. The Court of Appeal also indicated that: (a) under section 8(2) a court may allow particulars to be added if they have not been given earlier; (b) the address of the landlord’s agents in a section 20 notice exhibited to an affidavit was sufficient to comply with Landlord and Tenant Act 1987 s48; and (c) the judge was entitled to find that over 13 weeks’ rent was owing at the date of the hearing, despite the fact that housing benefit was owed by the local authority and was paid after the hearing, with the result that the arrears were reduced below the equivalent of 13 weeks’ rent.
Note: Since amendments made by the Housing Act 1996, Ground 8 is satisfied by eight weeks or two months arrears, rather than 12 weeks or three months.