Land ; ;Security of tenure mutual housing association tenancy neither secure nor protected when granted tenancy becoming secure on demutualisation and right to buy acquired ;Ali Bhai v Black Roof Community Housing Association Ltd: CA (Kennedy and Jonathan Parker LJJ): 2 November 2000 ;A fully mutual housing association in December 1985 granted to the claimants a tenancy of its flat which conferred neither a protected nor a secure tenancy. ;The Local Government and Housing Act 1989 added para 4(c) to Sched 18 to the Housing Act 1988, which provided: The repeals in s.80 of the Housing Act 1985 (c) do not have effect in relation to a tenancy while it is a housing association tenancy. The association ceased to be a mutual in 1991 and became a limited company. ;An arbitrator appointed under the Independent Housing Ombudsman scheme held that the tenancy was an assured tenancy. On the claimants appeal to the county court, the judge held that they were not secure tenants. The claimants appealed. ;Jan Luba QC (instructed by Thomas & Co) for the claimants. Stephen Knafler (instructed by Evans Butler Wade) for the company. ;Held, allowing the appeal, that, although the expression housing association tenancy was not defined in para 4(c), it could be inferred that the definition of housing association in the Rent Act 1977 (which confined the concept to mutual associations) applied; that para 4(c), on its true construction, therefore created the possibility of the claimants tenancy becoming a secure tenancy if the landlords interest should become vested in a non-mutual housing association; and that, accordingly, the claimants had become secure tenants when the association became a non-mutual housing association and thus had acquired a right to buy the tenanted property. ; ; ;