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SHLA Annual Conference 2025

Thursday 13th March 2025, The Law Society, 113 Chancery Lane, London, WC2A 1PL

Programme may be subject to change

Time Session Topic and Speakers Chair
9.00am – 9.25am Registration
9.30am Chair’s Welcome Welcome Co-Chairs Katrina Robinson MBE and Elizabeth England
9.40am – 10.20am Keynote Speaker Keynote Address

Ian McDermott (Chief Executive of Peabody Trust and Vice Chair of G15)

 Andrew Atkinson
10.25am – 11.25am Breakout Session 1 Defending EPA Claims

Michele Glazebrook

Simon Strelitz (Five Paper Chambers)

How to Defend EPA Claims and the expert evidence needed to do so.  This session will cover:

  • An examination of the NiP
  • Access issues
  • Dealing with directions
  • Evidence
  • What is prejudicial to health; does one mouse make a summer?
  • How to rebut expert evidence
 Dorota Pawlowski
10.25am – 11.25am Breakout Session 2 Mediation – Options and Future Costs 

Laura Tweedy (Gatehouse Chambers)

Helen Curtis (Garden Court Chambers)

 Elaine Marshall
11.30am – 11.55am Break
12.00noon – 1.00pm Breakout Session 3 Hoarding: Possession Cases & the Court of Protection 

Peggy Etiebet (Cornerstone Barristers) and Rosie Brown (Trowers & Hamlins LLP)

Hoarding is one of the more difficult breaches of a tenancy agreement for landlords to manage effectively.  This seminar will address:
  • Does the tenant have litigation capacity?
  • Does the tenant have capacity to make decisions regarding his items and belongings?
  • What happens if the tenant does not engage with a capacity assessment?
  • What steps may be taken to demonstrate there is no reasonable alternative to possession?
  • Should an application to the Court of Protection be made?
 Andrew Lane
12.00noon – 1.00pm Breakout Session 4 Mandatory Grounds in ASB Cases

Helen Tucker (Anthony Collins Solicitors)

Daniel Skinner (Poplar HARCA)

 Imran Mustak
1.05pm – 2.05pm Lunch
2.10pm – 3.10pm Breakout Session 5 Preparing for Equality Act Defences

Donna McCarthy (Devonshires)

Stephanie Lovegrove (4-5 Gray’s Inn)

 Katrina Robinson MBE
2.10pm – 3.10pm Breakout Session 6 Succession and discretionary offers: best practice

Victoria Osler (Cornerstone Barristers)

Jessie Napier

The Localism Act 2011 restricted secure tenancy succession rights, although it also allowed social landlords to extend the same.  Many have preferred to adopt discretionary offer policies to afford them the flexibility not to make an offer at all, or to do so but only with regard to some of the surviving household and/or in respect of another property.  This session will look at how succession is presently operated by social landlords, and how best to ensure the integrity of the process.  Jesse Napier is a Housing Investigations Manager at the Royal Borough of Kensington & Chelsea and is on the Executive Committee of the Tenancy Fraud Forum and Victoria Osler is a barrister at Cornerstone Barristers ranked as a leading junior both by Chambers & partners and Legal 500.

 Iris Ferber KC
3.15pm – 4.00pm Group Session View From The Bench

Judge Jan Luba KC

 Nicholas Grundy KC
4.05pm – 4.20pm Break
4.25pm – 5.00pm Expert Panel Rental Reform Q & A 

Yetunde Dania (Trowers & Hamlins LLP)

Kuljit Bhogal KC (Cornerstone Barristers)

Emily Orme (Paradigm Housing)

An exciting opportunity to engage with leading housing professionals The Renters’ Rights Bill.

 Dambu Tenner
5.05pm – 5.15pm Chair’s Closing Closing Co-Chairs Katrina Robinson MBE and Elizabeth England
5.15pm – 7.15pm Networking Drinks Reception
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