Failure to properly consider options for use of land

Archived press release

Date Published: 07/09/08

Croydon Council wrongly raised three residents’ expectations of being able to buy land behind their homes to extend their gardens, even after it decided to use the land for allotments.

Croydon Council wrongly raised three residents’ expectations of being able to buy land behind their homes to extend their gardens, finds Local Government Ombudsman, Jerry White. In his report, issued today (7 August 2008) he says the Council did not properly consider options for using the land, and continued to lead the complainants to believe they could buy it, even after it had decided to use the land as allotments instead.

The Council has agreed to reconsider what the land should be used for and pay compensation to the complainants, the amount depending on whether or not it does sell them the land.

Three residents (called ‘Mr A’, ‘Mr B’ and ‘Mrs C’ in the report) complained that the Council decided to use vacant land behind their homes for allotments when it had previously offered to sell the land to them, and that it delayed making this decision for three years. Mr A had unnecessarily incurred the expense of establishing who owned the land and, as a result of the Council’s new decision, all three complainants lost the opportunity to extend their gardens. They were also concerned that they would lose privacy when the allotments were brought into use. 

The Ombudsman found that the Council appeared not to know that it owned the land when Mr A first enquired about this in 2003. The Council then did not properly consider other options for the land at the time the complainants made their request to buy it. If the Council had clarified its intentions at the outset, it would not have raised their expectations that they would be able to buy the land and extend their gardens. The Council continued to lead the complainants to believe that they could buy the land, and appeared to have made a firm decision to sell it to them in June 2005, but then delayed in proceeding with the sale. Without this delay it is likely that the sale would have been completed well before the Council decided to use the land for a different purpose, over a year later. The Council then did not tell the complainants for over six months that it had decided not to sell the land, so they lost the opportunity to object to and possibly reverse the decision. 

The Council agreed to suspend the allotments project and allow elected members the opportunity to consider a report from officers before making a decision on how the land should be used. The Council agreed that if Members decide not to proceed with the sale of the land to the complainants, it would pay compensation of £500 to the two landowners, and £300 to Mr B (a housing association tenant) for their raised expectations that resulted from the Council’s delays. If members decide to continue with the sale, the Council agreed to pay the complainants £100 for their time and trouble in pursuing the complaint. Regardless of the eventual decision on the sale of the land, the Council agreed to pay Mr A an additional £100 to compensate him for the cost of establishing that the Council owned the land.

Report refs 07B07461, 07B07463 and 07B07473