CA-2024-002348 - [2025] EWCA Civ 1390

There is a second, separate reason why the appellant is unable to establish that the PCP is discriminatory. It, that is the PCP, must put the persons with protected characteristics at a particular disadvantage. There needs to be a causal connection between the PCP and the particular disadvantage.

Here, the PCP is the provision of the housing allocation scheme which provides that persons cannot be allocated an additional 50 or 150 points for a low or medium priority health and wellbeing need. There is no evidence that the inability to acquire an additional 50 or 150 points is the cause of the particular disadvantage being alleged, i.e. that certain groups are waiting longer than others to be allocated social housing under Part VI. The evidence, such as it is, suggests that any time waiting to be allocated an appropriately sized property is linked to the shortage of available properties within the borough not the PCP and the fact that homeless households cannot claim an additional 50 or 150 points for a low or medium health and wellbeing need.

For those reasons, I would dismiss grounds 1 and 3 and I would refuse the appellant’s application to admit new evidence.