When you “notify” do you also “inform”? asks Nicholas Dobson
Why would people spend good money in getting lawyers to argue for them over the meaning of words? Are they all practising pedants?
Not at all. For if “equity does nothing in vain” neither will most litigants. There will usually be some fundamental and serious issue riding on disputed interpretations of words. And so there was in the Court of Appeal last October where the legal meaning of the words “inform” and “notify” came up for scrutiny in the context of homelessness law (see Ali v. Birmingham City Council [2009] EWCA Civ 1279).
This is in the Housing Act 1996 (HA 1996), pt 7. In particular, s 193 imposes a duty on local housing authorities to secure that accommodation is available for a homeless applicant where the authority is satisfied that the applicant is homeless, eligible for assistance, has a priority need and is not satisfied that the applicant became homeless intentionally. However, under s 193(5) an authority ceases to be subject to this duty “if the applicant, having been informed by the authority
