Nottinghamshire Indymedia

Events

Startpage

> UK Indymedia
> Global Indymedia

> Guidelines
> Chatroom
> About Us
> Security

> Projects
> On Ya Mobile
> Local Weather

Support Us

We are an all volunteer collective and receive no regular funding. Please consider donating.


Local Events

This events wire is no longer being updated. Please use the new site to publicise events.

More local events on Veggies/Sumac Diary


Freedom of Information

Search archives

Topics

Analysis
Animal Liberation
Anti-militarism
Anti-racism
Bio-technology
Climate Chaos
Culture
Ecology
Education
Energy Crisis
Free Spaces
Gender
Globalisation
Health
History
Indymedia
Iraq
Migration
Ocean Defence
Other Press
Palestine
Repression
Social Struggles
Technology
Terror War
Workers' Movements
Zapatista

Kollektives

Birmingham
Cambridge
Liverpool
London
Oxford
Sheffield
South Coast
Wales
World

Other UK IMCs
Bristol/South West
London
Northern Indymedia
Scotland

IMCs


www.indymedia.org

Projects
print
radio
satellite tv
video

Africa

Europe
antwerpen
armenia
athens
austria
barcelona
belarus
belgium
belgrade
brussels
bulgaria
calabria
croatia
cyprus
emilia-romagna
estrecho / madiaq
galiza
germany
grenoble
hungary
ireland
istanbul
italy
la plana
liege
liguria
lille
linksunten
lombardia
madrid
malta
marseille
nantes
napoli
netherlands
northern england
nottingham imc
paris/île-de-france
patras
piemonte
poland
portugal
roma
romania
russia
sardegna
scotland
sverige
switzerland
torun
toscana
ukraine
united kingdom
valencia

Latin America
argentina
bolivia
chiapas
chile
chile sur
cmi brasil
cmi sucre
colombia
ecuador
mexico
peru
puerto rico
qollasuyu
rosario
santiago
tijuana
uruguay
valparaiso
venezuela

Oceania
aotearoa
brisbane
burma
darwin
jakarta
manila
melbourne
perth
qc
sydney

South Asia
india


United States
arizona
arkansas
asheville
atlanta
Austin
binghamton
boston
buffalo
chicago
cleveland
colorado
columbus
dc
hawaii
houston
hudson mohawk
kansas city
la
madison
maine
miami
michigan
milwaukee
minneapolis/st. paul
new hampshire
new jersey
new mexico
new orleans
north carolina
north texas
nyc
oklahoma
philadelphia
pittsburgh
portland
richmond
rochester
rogue valley
saint louis
san diego
san francisco
san francisco bay area
santa barbara
santa cruz, ca
sarasota
seattle
tampa bay
united states
urbana-champaign
vermont
western mass
worcester

West Asia
Armenia
Beirut
Israel
Palestine

Topics
biotech

Process
fbi/legal updates
mailing lists
process & imc docs
tech

Council house evictions rise 42% in Nottingham

Notts IMC + Andy | 28.01.2009 08:49 | Social Struggles

In the midst of the scandal surrounding the uncovering of corruption at Nottingham City Homes (NCH), other important news regarding council housing in Nottingham has passed more quietly. Council house evictions for rent arrears rose by 42% in 2008 whilst Nottingham City Council (NCC) were found to be refusing around 60% of applications for Discretionary Housing Payments. Discretionary Housing Payments are meant to be used by Local Authorities to help those whose housing benefit doesn't cover their rent. Due to the underspend NCC's grant for such payments has been reduced for the 6th year in a row. In addition, the Council's Housing Benefit Decision Notices have been deemed "Inadequate and illegal" by one commentator.

Whilst corruption in NCH is old news to some of our readers, the revelation that the NCH disability forum has a BNP activist as its Vice Chair has come as a shock. The individual involed also claims to attend the NCH Black and Minority Ethnic forum.

Newswire: Nottingham Loses Out again | Housing Benefit Decision Notices Inadequate and Illegal | Big Underspend on Payments to help Poor Tenants | BNP member on NCH Disabled Person's panel | Squatting and the Sept 2nd raid on Nottingham City Homes offices

Links: Nottingham City Council LOLs | Notts Social Struggles newswire



Discretionary housing payments

Nottingham City Council has consistently underspent its allocation for Discretionary Housing Payments, despite rent arrears evictions going through the roof.

If your housing benefit doesn't cover your rent you might be entitled to further help from the little promoted Discretionary Housing Payments scheme.

Yet despite underspending their allocation for every year the scheme has been in operation, NCC's Housing Benefits office refuses nearly 60% of applications. Meanwhile, evictions from rented properties went up by 42% last year, mostly for rent arrears.

Housing benefit notification letters

The standard Housing benefit notification letter used by Nottingham City Council misses vital information required by law.

The law requires that certain information, including details of appeal rights, is included in all decision notices sent to those who have applied for Housing and/or Council Tax Benefit.

However, Nottingham City Council's notices lack this info. They claim that it used to be provided on the back but 'recent amendments' have led to this gone missing. They claim that they have a system where a separate A4 sheet is added manually but none of those that I received included this.

However, a silver lining is that if you have received one of these notices without the required information and for one reason or another you missed your chance to appeal, the fact that the appeal details were left off should mean it is virtually automatic that a late appeal is accepted, as long as no more than 13 months have passed since the date of the decision.

Notts IMC + Andy

Download this article in pdf format >>
Email this article to someone >>
Submit an addition or make a quick comment on this article >>

Housing Benefit Decision Notices

29.01.2009 08:49

I've got a couple more things coming up on NCCLols about the Housing benefits service, just waiting for my hangover to go away so I can actually think about what I'm writing...

I would be interested to know from anybody who has received a Housing Benefit decision notice in January, the more recent the better, whether the layout has been changed to include details of appeal rights or whether you were sent a separate sheet with this information with it.

Contact me via  http://ncclols.blogspot.com/ either by email or in the comments.

Cheers

Andy

Andy