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KM, R (on the application of) v Cambridgeshire County Council
Factual and Procedural Background
The Appellant is a 26-year-old man with profound disabilities who resides with his family in The County. The Defendant, a local authority (“Defendant”), assessed his community-care needs under section 2(1) of the Chronically Sick and Disabled Persons Act 1970 (“the 1970 Act”) and, by letter dated 3 June 2010, offered an annual direct payment of approximately £85,000. The Appellant contended that this figure was unlawful—either for want of adequate reasons or because it was irrational—and sought judicial review, requesting that the decision be quashed or replaced with a determination of £120,000.
Permission for judicial review was refused by Judge Bidder in the Administrative Court. The Court of Appeal (constituted by Judge May, Judge Jackson and Judge Tomlinson) granted permission but ultimately dismissed the substantive claim. The present appeal is from that dismissal. A proposed third ground—inviting the Supreme Court to depart from R v Gloucestershire CC ex p Barry—was abandoned at the hearing when it became clear that resource constraints played no part in the Defendant’s impugned decision.
Legal Issues Presented
- Whether the Defendant’s determination to pay the Appellant £85,000 was irrational in the sense of failing to reflect the reasonable cost of meeting his eligible needs.
- Whether the Defendant gave legally adequate reasons for that determination.
Arguments of the Parties
Appellant's Arguments
- The £85,000 figure was irrational because it was not the product of an itemised or transparent costing of the services required to meet his critical needs.
- The Defendant failed to provide adequate reasons, thereby breaching public-law duties of fairness and transparency.
- Initially, the Appellant argued that Barry was wrongly decided and that resource considerations should play no role; this ground was not pursued at the substantive hearing.
Defendant's Arguments
- The offer was rationally calculated using a Resource Allocation System (“RAS”) and an Upper Banding Calculator (“UBC”), tools endorsed by statutory guidance and case-law.
- Any computational flaws (e.g., assumptions about family support or hours of paid care) inured to the Appellant’s benefit, making the figure more, not less, generous.
- Comprehensive explanations were eventually supplied; any initial opacity has been cured by evidence produced during litigation.
- The decision did not rely on general resource constraints but on achieving equity between service-users with similar needs.
Table of Precedents Cited
| Precedent | Rule or Principle Cited For | Application by the Court |
|---|---|---|
| R v Gloucestershire CC ex p Barry [1997] AC 584 | Availability of local-authority resources is relevant at the eligibility stage under s. 2(1) of the 1970 Act. | The Court noted but did not revisit Barry; resource-based arguments were irrelevant to the present decision. |
| R (McDonald) v Kensington & Chelsea RBC [2011] UKSC 33 | Commentary on interaction between resources and community-care duties. | Cited only to explain why the Appellant initially sought to challenge Barry. |
| R (Savva) v Kensington & Chelsea RBC [2010] EWCA Civ 1209 | Requirement that reasons for community-care budgets be sufficiently detailed. | Relied on for the standard of reasoning expected from local authorities. |
| R (W) v Birmingham CC [2011] EWHC 1147 | Legality of limiting services to certain eligibility bands. | Referenced in passing; not determinative. |
| R (L) v Leeds CC [2010] EWHC 3324 | Intensity of judicial review correlates with impact on the individual. | Guided the Court’s approach to scrutiny in high-impact social-care cases. |
| Practice Statement (Judicial Precedent) [1966] 1 WLR 1234 | Supreme Court’s power to depart from its own precedent. | Invoked by Appellant in abandoned third ground concerning Barry. |
Court's Reasoning and Analysis
1. Rationality. The Court, per Judge Wilson, accepted that the Defendant’s use of a RAS and UBC is lawful and endorsed by both statutory guidance and prior authority. Although the RAS was premised on an assumption that the Appellant would receive no unpaid family support and the UBC assumed 14 hours of paid care daily, those assumptions favoured the Appellant by inflating the indicative sum. No evidence dislodged the provisional conclusion that £85,000 was at least sufficient, and possibly generous, to meet eligible needs.
2. Adequacy of Reasons. The Defendant’s explanatory process was “tortuous”: detailed reasoning was not supplied until five months after the initial offer. Ideally, a support plan should have itemised costs or grouped services with indicative costs, in line with guidance in Savva. Nevertheless, extensive documentary evidence produced during litigation now explains the computation and permits full judicial scrutiny. In these circumstances, quashing the decision would serve no practical purpose and could operate to the Appellant’s detriment.
3. Resource Constraints. The Court emphasised that the Defendant did not rely on general resource shortages; equity among service-users, not budgetary limitation, underpinned the decision. Accordingly, the abandoned argument that Barry was wrongly decided was irrelevant, and the Court purposely refrained from re-examining that precedent.
4. Intensity of Review. Recognising the profound effect of community-care decisions, the Court applied a high level of scrutiny (per L v Leeds), yet still found the determination lawful.
Holding and Implications
APPEAL DISMISSED.
Direct Consequences: the Defendant’s determination of an annual direct payment of approximately £85,000 stands. The Appellant receives no higher sum, and the matter is not remitted for reconsideration.
Broader Impact: the judgment reaffirms that (a) local authorities may lawfully use RAS and similar tools as starting points for calculating personal budgets, provided cross-checks are undertaken; (b) while detailed reasons are required, subsequent litigation materials can cure initial explanatory deficits; and (c) the Supreme Court’s earlier decision in Barry remains undisturbed, though the Court signalled caution regarding its scope. No new precedent was set on the substantive reach of the 1970 Act.
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