A young mother-of-four has won the right to live in her late grandmother’s Canonbury home after a two-year battle with Islington Council.
Danni Morris, 24, gave up her Clerkenwell council flat while heavily pregnant in order to care for her cancer-stricken nan in August 2017.
But shortly after moving back to the family home in Downham Road, where she grew up, her nan died - 24 hours before Barclays worker Danni handed back the keys to her old flat.
Her application to succeed the tenancy was then rejected because she hadn't lived there for a year. She was told to leave and faced being left homeless with her newborn baby Khairi and three-year-old son Kaiden.
After failing with a plea to Partners for Improvement, which manages her home, Danni launched legal action with the help of solicitors at Hodge Jones & Allen.
The case was eventually dropped last month, with the council saying because Danni had given birth to twins, the three-bedroom house was no longer too big for her family's needs and she could stay.
She said: "I am so over the moon that me and my kids have been allowed to stay and I can't put into words how happy we are.
"This has gone on for two and a half years and it has been a really trying time. I had to go to the doctor as I was suffering from depression.
"I am really happy I don't have to uproot the children. My eldest Kayden has been asking if we are moving and I haven't been able to tell him until now."
A district judge at Clerkenwell and Shoreditch County Court accepted the resolution that allowed Danni to stay and granted a consent order, meaning neither side was at fault.
Danni did not succeed her nan's tenancy, but was offered a new tenancy as Islington Council had a responsibility to house her.
A council spokesperson said: "This was a highly unusual case. Legal proceedings were started because Ms Morris was not lawfully entitled to succeed her grandmother's tenancy - which remains the case - and the house was larger than she needed at the time.
"We still had a responsibility to house Ms Morris' family, and decided to use our discretion to offer her a new secure tenancy at Downham Road after Ms Morris had twins - a significant change of circumstances that meant the house was no longer larger than she needed."
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