Legal News
NHS Worker Banned From Living in Rent-free Garden Shed (26 September 2011)
Date: 26/09/2011
An NHS care worker has been ordered by the council to move out of her rent-free garden shed home. Victoria Campbell and her boyfriend, Bill Warden, moved into the shed in her parents’ back garden in Hampshire in September last year. Yet Miss Campbell's local council has ruled that the structure in which they are living fails to provide “adequate living conditions” and creates an “undesirable precedent”. Officials have ordered the pair to move out within nine months or face a fine.
Miss Campbell and her partner had hoped to accumulate savings of around £20,000 over five years in order to place a deposit on a house. Miss Campbell claimed that she considered renting akin to “throwing money away” and described living in a shed in the meantime as the “perfect idea”. Miss Campbell said that she had written to all the neighbours living within a 30-metre radius of the shed and “did not receive a single complaint”. She stated her frustration at the council’s move and added that if the council forced them out, they would be homeless, and the 15ft x 15ft shed would remain regardless.
Miss Campbell’s local councillor, Paul Buckley, described the local housing authority as “sensitive” to Miss Campbell's circumstances and said that although the committee had refused planning permission, a generous compliance period of nine months had been provided to allow Miss Campbell and her partner the time to seek alternative accommodation.
Duncan Lewis’ team of housing solicitors can provide legal advice on a range of housing issues.