Information Commissioner: DWP's money offer fails to resolve Declan's data protection case against Secretary of State for Work and Pensions Iain Duncan Smith
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Updated complaint to the UN: Revised paragraph 31
31. On 7 January 2014, the Applicant and his wife enrolled in a three-month rolling winter night shelter programme for rough sleepers run by the West London Churches Homeless Concern (WLCHC). Two days later, on 9 January, they turned up at Barnsbury Jobcentre of the Department for Work and Pensions to sign on for Jobseeker’s Allowance only to be told that the Applicant’s joint claim had been terminated because they had earlier refused to agree to Jobseeker’s Agreements drawn up by the Jobcentre that they had argued were inappropriate. Neither the Applicant nor his wife were issued with a letter of termination with or without appeal rights, and on 22 January the Applicant filed a claim in the High Court for judicial review against Secretary of State for Work and Pensions Iain Duncan Smith on the ground of procedural unfairness (see Annex 10, Department for Work and Pensions: Application for Judicial Review, pp. 28-33) [emphasis added]. Secretary of State Duncan Smith, in the Acknowledgement of Service, acknowledged that the Applicant had legitimate grounds for refusing to sign his Jobseeker’s Agreement as varied by the Jobcentre and he accordingly paid the Applicant arrears of Jobseeker's Allowance to 9 January 2014 (see Annex 11, Department for Work and Pensions: Order by High Judge Phillips, p. 34). On 21 January 2014, the day before the Applicant lodged his case in the High Court against Secretary of State Duncan Smith, he and his wife were approached by a WLCHC worker about an offer of a flat that had been made by the Single Homeless Project (SHP) on behalf of Mayor of London Boris Johnson's Greater London Authority (GLA) Housing First programme; however, the offer was dependent upon the Applicant and his wife receiving Jobseeker’s Allowance or alternatively producing two employment contracts that would cover the amount they would need to qualify for Housing Benefit. On 5 February 2014, following a donation from an American benefactor, the Applicant and his wife presented SHP GLA Housing First with two such contracts as employees of N4CM, but they were nevertheless rendered street homeless when the WLCHC night shelters closed on 13 April 2014, due to the accommodation on offer being unavailable.
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Church and State website
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Let me recommend an important web site churchandstate.org.uk. Operating out of London this well-designed and exciting web site covers church-state, population, climate change and other issues. Check it out -- Edd Doerr, President, Americans for Religious Liberty
Update (our NOW TV service cut within minutes of posting this blog): Oops! We lose our Now TV service
