Housing (Right to adequate)

Primary tabs

The applicants, occupiers of the Harry Gwala informal settlement, argued for the provision of certain interim basic services in their settlement, pending a decision on whether the settlement was to be upgraded on site or relocated to formal housing (whereupon such services would be provided permanently). They relied primarily on sections 26 and 27 of the Constitution and chapters 12 (emergency housing situations) and 13 (upgrading of informal settlements) of the National Housing Code.

On September 17, 2015, the UN Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (CESCR) published its first recommendations in response to an individual complaint, regarding a violation of the right to housing, under the Optional Protocol to the...

The applicants occupy dilapidated buildings on land owned by the Rustenburg Local Municipality. Since 2004 the municipality had been planning to develop this land. The municipality met with the residents several times to discuss the development plan and to obtain consent from the residents, but no consensus was reached. The residents refused to leave their homes and accept alternative accommodation.

Over the last decade, the legal opportunities for claiming economic, social and cultural (ESC) rights have greatly increased in many parts of Africa. This can be seen in the growing use of litigation strategies amongst civil society, increased legal mobilisation of...

Habitat International Coalition (HIC) and their allies in Egypt are seeking letters of solidarity to condemn gross violations of human rights....

From 26 to 28 August, 2015, the Women and ESCR Working Group held an international strategy meeting to promote women's ESCR in Montevideo, Uruguay. The meeting – “Advancing Women’s ESCR: Alternative Visions of Development, Land and Property Rights”...

Due to the deterioration of the buildings within Schubart Park, a state-subsidized residential complex, the City stopped the water and electricity supply while 700 families were living there. Residents protested by lighting fires and throwing objects from buildings. The police removed these residents and would not allow them or any other residents from this complex to return. Negotiations occurred between the residents and the City to find temporary accommodations for the displaced residents, but no agreement was reached.

A mentally disabled woman with three children sought to set aside an eviction order from the family home obtained by her former husband. In making the eviction order, the magistrate found that the man was the registered owner of the property and the former wife and the children occupied the home after he had withdrawn his consent. The magistrate acknowledged the woman’s disability, but found that the former wife had suitable alternative accommodation available because she could move back in with her relatives (which she denied).

This case concerns a claim for damages by a woman with severe disabilities, Mrs. Bernard and her husband, Mr. Bernard, her sole caregiver, alleging that the local Housing Department did not provide them with accommodations suitably adapted for her disability. This failure, it was contended, constituted a violation of the European Convention of Human Rights (ECHR). Damages were sought under the Human Rights Act (HRA), which is the implementing legislation for the ECHR in the UK.

The plaintiffs in this case were members of the Irish Travelling community, traditionally a nomadic people. This particular group of Travellers lived on an unofficial halting or caravan, site in Limerick City for over eight years, in conditions of extreme deprivation and squalor, without running water, toilet facilities, domestic refuse storage and collection, and hard surfaces for their caravans.