“Even if such fees can be expenses connected with education, the second part of the test is whether the prospective student’s educational needs require it, which ultimately must be for the authority rather than him to decide. Your clients no doubt argue that they need to go to university but does the legislation require the authority to give the assistance sought … when it would take up a very significant portion of its hard-pressed resources? Newcastle is adamant that it does not.”
“Firstly, there is the point about ‘expenses connected with education’. Secondly, even if this phrase does cover such fees, the authority does not consider it to be an appropriate use of its scarce resources to act as a surrogate loan company when Parliament has decided that persons with your clients’ immigration status should no longer have access to such assistance. In addition there is the considerable risk that the authority would not be able to enforce any loan it makes, because it would not be able to keep track of your clients and their earnings, even if they remain in the UK. …”
“12. Mr Harrop-Griffiths, for Newcastle City Council, says that meeting expenses connected with education does not, as a matter of statutory construction of section 24B(2), embrace tuition fees. I find that a very difficult argument to accept. The material words are not defined in the Act and it is not suggested that they are terms of art bearing particular meanings. They are ordinary English words, which need, in context, to be construed. If, in ordinary parlance, I say that I am meeting the expenses of, say, a relative in connection with education, it would, I suggest, be a surprise to anyone listening to learn that my apparent generosity had nothing to do with the cost of tuition. The argument is that expenses connected with someone's education presupposes that such a person is in education, and that therefore tuition fees had either been met or are not, as a matter of language, part of the expenses connected with education, which education (by definition) is in place. 13. I consider such an argument as put on behalf of the City Council cannot be accepted. First, a principal expense associated with education is the cost of tuition. There is an inseparable connection between tuition and education. I appreciate there are well known instances of the autodidact, but this does not undermine the inseparability of the connection. Second, as a matter of ordinary, natural language, tuition fees are expenses connected with education. Third, the argument falls into difficulties as soon as it is questioned. Why might a text book recommended by a tutor be an expense connected with education, but not the expense associated with the tutor? Is extra tuition an expense connected with education? If so, why not tuition? These questions all reveal that the argument cannot, to my mind, succeed.”
"Provision of welfare services (1) Where a local authority having functions undersection 29 of the National Assistance Act 1948 are satisfied in the case of any person to whom that section applies who is ordinarily resident in their area that it is necessary in order to meet the needs of that person for that authority to make arrangements for all or any of the following matters, namely - (a) the provision of practical assistance for that person in his home; (b) the provision for that person of, or assistance to that person in obtaining, wireless, television, library or similar recreational facilities; (c) the provision for that person of lectures, games, outings or other recreational facilities outside his home or assistance to that person in taking advantage of educational facilities available to him; (d) the provision for that person of facilities for, or assistance in, travelling to and from his home for the purpose of participating in any services provided under arrangements made by the authority under the said section 29 or, with the approval of the authority, in any services provided otherwise than as aforesaid which are similar to services which could be provided under such arrangements; (e) the provision of assistance for that person in arranging for the carrying out of any works of adaptation in his home or the provision of any additional facilities designed to secure his greater safety, comfort or convenience; (f) facilitating the taking of holidays by that person, whether at holiday homes or otherwise and whether provided under arrangements made by the authority or otherwise; (g) the provision of meals for that person whether in his home or elsewhere; (h) the provision for that person of, or assistance to that person in obtaining, a telephone and any special equipment necessary to enable him to use a telephone," then, . . . subject . . . [. . . to the provisions ofsection 7(1) of the Local Authority Social Services Act 1970 (which requires local authorities in the exercise of certain functions, including functions under the said section 29, to act under the general guidance of the Secretary of State)] [and to the provisions of section 7A of that Act (which requires local authorities to exercise their social services functions in accordance with directions given by the Secretary of State)], it shall be the duty of that authority to make those arrangements in exercise of their functions under the said section 29."
“This appeal raises an important point of interpretation ofsection 2(1) of the Chronically Sick and Disabled Persons Act 1970 . Can a local authority properly take into account its own financial resources when assessing the needs of a disabled person under section 2(1)? The appellants, the Gloucestershire County Council and the Secretary of State for Health say yes, the respondent Mr. Barry says no. The question has given rise to a considerable difference of judicial opinion, so I shall give my conclusion in my own words. At first sight the contentions advanced on behalf of Mr. Barry are compelling. A person's needs, it was submitted, depend upon the nature and extent of his disability. They cannot be affected by, or depend upon, the local authority's ability to meet them. They cannot vary according to whether the authority has more or less money currently available. Take the case of an authority which assesses a person's needs as twice weekly help at home with laundry and cleaning. In the following year nothing changes except that the authority has less money available. If the authority's financial resources can be properly be taken into account, it would be open to the authority to re-assess that person's needs in the later year as nil. That cannot be right: the person's needs have not changed. This is an alluring argument but I am unable to accept it. It is flawed by a failure to recognise that needs for services cannot sensibly be assessed without having some regard to the cost of providing them. A person's need for a particular type or level of service cannot be decided in a vacuum from which all considerations of cost have been expelled. I turn to the statute. Under section 2(1) "needs" are to be assessed in the context of, and by reference to, the provision of certain types of assistance for promoting the welfare of disabled persons: home help, meals on wheels, holidays, home adaptation, and so forth. In deciding whether the disability of a particular person dictates a need for assistance and, if so, at what level, a social worker or anyone else must use some criteria. This is inevitably so. He will judge the needs for assistance against some standard, some criteria, whether spoken or unspoken. One important factor he will take into account will be what constitutes an acceptable standard of living today. Standards of living, however, vary widely. So do different people's ideas on the requirements of an acceptable standard of living. Thus something more concrete, capable of being applied uniformly, is called for assessing the needs of a given disabled person under the statute. Some more precisely defined standard is required, a more readily identifiable yardstick, than individual notions of current standards of living. Who is to set the standard? To this there can be only one answer: the relevant local authority, acting by its social services committee. The local authority sets the standards to be applied within its area. In setting the standards, or "eligibility criteria" as they have been called, the local authority must take into account current standards of living, with all the latitude inherent in this concept. The authority must also take into account the nature and extent of the disability. The authority will further take into account the manner in which, and the extent to which, quality of life would be improved by the provision of this or that service or assistance, at this or that level: for example, by home care, once a week or more frequently. The authority should also have regard to the cost of providing this or that service, at this or that level. The cost of daily home care, or of installing a ground floor lavatory for a disabled person in his home and widening the doors to take a wheelchair, may be substantial. The relative cost will be balanced against the relative benefit and the relative need for that benefit. Thus far the position is straightforward. The next step is the crucial step. In the same way as the importance to be attached to cost varies according to the benefit to be derived from the suggested expenditure, so also must the importance of cost vary according to the means of the person called upon to pay. An amount of money may be a large sum to one person, or to one person at a particular time, but of less consequence to another person, or to the same person at a different time. Once it is accepted, as surely must be right, that cost is a relevant factor in assessing a person's needs for the services listed in section 2(1), then in deciding how much weight is to be attached to cost some evaluation or assumption has to be made about the impact which the cost will have upon the authority. Cost is of more or less significance depending upon whether the authority currently has more or less money. Thus, depending upon the authority's financial position, so the eligibility criteria, setting out the degree of disability which must exist before help will be provided with laundry or cleaning or whatever, may properly be more or less stringent.”