THE House of Lords was expected to rule today on whether Leeds City Council breached the human rights of a family of gypsies.
The council evicted ther Maloney faily from a public recreation area.
The family claim the city council contravened their human rights by throwing them off land they occupied in Wakefield without licence or consent.
The Court of Appeal dismissed the case in March last year, but took the unusual step of referring it for a hearing before the Law Lords because of conflict between national and European rulings.
The family, who have been evicted from 50 sites, are legally aided in the case which is understood to have already cost about £300,000.
The Court of Appeal said last March that the family's only defence against possession proceedings by the council lay in the assertion that it would infringe their rights under Article 8 of the European Convention.
This provides that everyone has a right to respect for his private and family life and home.
Possession proceedings over the land began at Leeds County Court but were transferred to the High Court, where a deputy judge ruled that human rights were not infringed.
Alex Offer, representing the Maloney family, said the European Court ruling was a development of the law since the House of Lords ruling and should be used to arrive at a decision in the present case.
