LORD JUSTICE WARD: In March 2002 Michelle Robinson was an 18-year-old young lady with no children. She was at the time in receipt of income-based job seeker's allowance, and she was changing her home. On 11th March, a Monday, she became the tenant of a property at 128 Trafalgar Road, Washington. On that day, she became liable to pay the rent for that property.

She was, unfortunately, suffering some financial hardship and had applied for a social fund (or a crisis loan) to enable her to purchase the necessary furniture -- not least the bed on which she had to sleep -- which would enable her to move into occupation of her new flat. Sadly, the cheque for that loan was sent to the wrong address, and poor Miss Robinson had to wait for some number of days before she was able to furnish her new flat. It was thus only on 20th March, a Wednesday, that she moved into occupation of her new home.

Being short of money, she appropriately applied for housing benefit. That application was made on the same day as she got her tenancy, 11th March. Eventually, after appeals here and appeals there, she was paid her housing benefit from the week commencing 18th March. She is happy with that situation now. The local authority, the City of Sunderland, have accepted that position, but the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions is anxious about the way in which the various decisions have been taken and appeals to this court.

Perhaps it would be sensible to set out the statutory background before embarking on an analysis of the decisions which bring us to this court. Section 130(1) of the Social Security Contributions and Benefits Act 1992 provides as follows:

The Regulations are made under the Housing Benefit (General) Regulations 1987. Regulation 2 defines a housing benefit week as a period of seven consecutive days beginning on a Monday. Regulation 5(1) sets out the circumstances in which a person is or is not to be treated as occupying a dwelling house as his home. Regulation 5(1) provides:

Regulation 5(6) is also marginally relevant, that provides:

More relevant for present purposes, indeed crucial to them, is regulation 65, which deals with the date on which entitlement is to commence. That provides:

I should mention, perhaps only in passing, regulation 72(11), which reads:

Now to the processing of Miss Robinson's claim. The housing benefit officer (or whoever the decision-maker was) was of the view that Miss Robinson was entitled to benefit from 25th March, that is to say the Monday in the week following her taking occupation of her flat. Miss Robinson was upset by that decision and asked for it to be reconsidered. Upon reconsideration, the decision was confirmed. She appealed to the appeal tribunal, which conducted a paper appeal on 19th December and decided that her appeal was to succeed. The basis of that decision was:

The local authority were dissatisfied with that result and it appealed to the Social Security Commissioners. The appeal was decided by Mr Commissioner Levenson on 15th April 2003. He said:

The Commissioner went on then to give his decision. He said:

The Secretary of State, being unhappy with that reasoning, applied for permission to appeal, which was eventually granted by Potter LJ. The point is apparently one of considerable importance in the day-to-day administration of housing benefit. So this court is entertaining the appeal even though it may be academic in this sense, namely that the local authority have exercised a power which apparently derives from regulation 72(11) to pay Miss Robinson from 18th March, which satisfies her and leaves them, if not happy, at least unable to do very much about it. But the Secretary of State remains distinctly unhappy with the reasoning of the Commissioner.

Miss Anderson, for whose concise arguments we are indebted, submits that he was wrong. She submits that regulation 65(2) is an exception to regulation 65(1). The ordinary rule is that a person's entitlement to a payment of housing benefit on a new claim begins on the Monday of the benefit week following the week in which the claim was made. Regulation 65(2) is, she submits, restricted in its application to cases where the claimant first becomes liable for payments in respect of a dwelling that is occupied as his home in the same week as the claimant is eligible for benefit. Regulation 65(2), therefore, represents an important part of the statutory scheme and an important exception to the general rule. Regulation 65(2) applies to new obligations rather than pre-existing obligations which could, in theory, run back many years, hence the concern of the Secretary of State that if the Commissioner's reasoning is applied it could add substantially to the financial burden on the State.

Taking the facts of this case, and looking at the first week, commencing Monday 11th March, Miss Robinson's position was that she was liable to make payments in respect of the dwelling because she had that day taken a weekly tenancy and had become liable to pay the first week's rent which was then due. She was not, however, occupying the dwelling as her home, as that has to be understood applying regulation 5, because she was still occupying her former abode as her home. Consequently, in week 1 she would not be able to satisfy the eligibility conditions provided by section 131(a). She was liable to make payments in respect of the dwelling house, but she did not occupy the dwelling as her home.

In week 2, commencing Monday 18th March, she did satisfy the eligibility requirement of section 131(a) because during that week she moved into her new flat on Wednesday, and henceforth occupied it as her home. So she is entitled to housing benefit from that time. The crucial question is from what date the benefit is to be paid. That, of course, brings regulation 65 into play. I must examine that.

I accept the first submission of Miss Anderson that regulation 65(1) sets out a general rule to which regulation 65(2) is the exception. That conclusion must follow from the fact that regulation 65(1) is made subject to paragraph (2). What then is the general rule? The language is not entirely clear: a person who makes a claim and is otherwise entitled to housing benefit, shall be entitled to that benefit from the benefit week following the date on which his claim is made or is treated as made. In the words, "the date on which his claim is or is treated as made", there are obvious alternative dates, and the question is: which one? On one view of it, the date on which this claim is made is 11th and, on that view, the benefit would be payable from 18th. On the other hand if the claim is treated as made on the date on which she became eligible for housing benefit, that is to say the day she moved in, Wednesday 20th, then the benefit would be paid from the following Monday 25th.

There is no other guidance as to which of those two alternatives one has to chose. There is no help as to what the words "treated as made" might mean. But I am persuaded by Miss Anderson that the words "treated as made" are the applicable words on the week in which the claim is made, Monday 11th. She was not eligible and her claim would on that basis ordinarily be dismissed. But it would cause administrative havoc if every applicant for housing benefit were to be required to fill in a separate claim for the next week and the next week and so on. There is obvious good sense in treating a claim as extant and still available to abide the time when all the conditions for payment are satisfied.

I conclude, therefore, that one cannot read the date on which the claim is made as the prevailing date, but must take the date of 20th as the date on which the claim is to be treated as being made, because that was the first time on which all of the eligibility conditions are satisfied. That is the only way to give purpose and efficacy to regulation 65(1).

It follows, therefore, that I accept the submission that, upon a proper construction of regulation 65(1), the benefit becomes payable from the benefit week following the date on which she moved into occupation; that means her claim is to be paid from Monday 25th March.

The Commissioner applied regulation 65(2), but the simple point made by the Secretary of State, as showing his error, is that the first time that Miss Robinson became liable to pay her rent was not in that week of 18th to 25th but in the preceding week from the time she took her tenancy. Consequently, on the facts, regulation 65(2) simply does not operate. I remind myself of what it says:

It follows, in my judgment, that the Secretary of State is correct in his construction of regulation 65(2). It does apply and only apply to the case where there is coincidence of entitlement to benefit and liability to pay rent; in other words it applies to a new tenancy. If, for example, Miss Robinson, taking her new tenancy on 11th, had been able to move in on 11th, or even to move in the course of the next seven days, she would have been able then to obtain what she really wanted, that is to say housing benefit from the commencement of her new tenancy. Regulation 65(2) gives new tenants coming into a new property and occupying a new property their entitlement to housing benefit from the very beginning of their occupation. Miss Robinson did not satisfy regulation 65(2) and, therefore, the Secretary of State's appeal must succeed.

The appeal will, therefore, be allowed. Formally, the benefit becomes payable from 25th, but Miss Robinson has already received all she is going to get and there will be the satisfaction to the Secretary of State of having his appeal allowed but no order for costs will be made on this appeal.

LORD JUSTICE DYSON: This appeal raises a very short point of construction of regulation 65(2) of the Housing Benefit (General) Regulations 1987. Regulation 65(1) provides the general rule for the determination of the benefit week from which housing benefit is payable. If a claimant is otherwise entitled to housing benefit, he is entitled to that benefit from the benefit week following the date on which his claim is, or is treated as, made.

This general rule is subject to exceptions, one of which is contained in regulation 65(2). It is the meaning and scope of that exception which lies at the heart of this appeal. Regulation 65(2) provides:

It follows that regulation 65(2) does not apply if a claimant becomes liable for the first time to make payments in respect of a dwelling house in a benefit week before he is otherwise entitled to housing benefit. In order to come within the regulation 65(2) exception, the liability to make payments on the property for the first time must coincide with the benefit week in which the claimant is otherwise entitled to housing benefit.

On the facts of this case, it is clear that there was no such coincidence. Miss Robinson was not entitled to housing benefit during a benefit week in which she became liable for the first time to make payments in respect of the dwelling.

In my judgment, the Commissioner misunderstood regulation 65(2). If he had applied it correctly, on the facts of this case, he would have held that benefit was payable from 25th March 2002.

For these reasons, which are, in effect, the same as those given by my Lord, Ward LJ, I too would allow the appeal.

SIR CHRISTOPHER STAUGHTON: If Miss Robinson had moved in on 11th March and had been liable to pay rent for the week then beginning, and had not been liable to pay rent in any previous week for that property, she would have received benefit from 11th March. That she has not achieved.

The Commissioner awarded benefit from Monday 18th March, although she had not moved in until Wednesday 20th. She does not appeal from that decision, nor does the Council of the City of Sunderland. But the Secretary of State is made of sterner stuff. Miss Anderson, on his or her behalf, claims that benefit should only have been paid from Monday 25th March.

Ward LJ and Dyson LJ have explained that the Secretary of State is right. They have done so with crystal clarity. If I try to improve on their reasoning, it would be a case of: