Summary: Miss X complained about the way the Council dealt with noise and anti-social behaviour complaints she made about her neighbours. There was fault by the Council that warranted a remedy.

The complaint

1. Miss X complained that the Council failed to properly consider complaints of noise and anti-social behaviour she made about her neighbours. She says the Council appear to excuse her neighbour’s behaviour and have not taken her complaints seriously. Miss X says the noise has affected her and her son’s health and wellbeing.

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What I have investigated

2. We have investigated the Councils actions in respect of noise and anti-social behaviour issues that Miss X has reported since January 2019. We have not investigated older events. We have not been able to comment on or investigate the actions the Council has taken in its capacity as a landlord. The reasons for this are set out in the last section of this statement.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

3. We investigate complaints about ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’. In this statement, I have used the word fault to refer to these. We must also consider whether any fault has had an adverse impact on the person making the complaint. I refer to this as ‘injustice’. If there has been fault which has caused an injustice, we may suggest a remedy. (Local Government Act 1974, sections 26(1) and 26A(1), as amended)
4. We cannot investigate complaints about the provision or management of social housing by a council acting as a registered social housing provider. (Local Government Act 1974, paragraph 5A schedule 5, as amended)
5. We cannot investigate late complaints unless we decide there are good reasons. Late complaints are when someone takes more than 12 months to complain to us about something a council has done. (Local Government Act 1974, sections 26B and 34D, as amended)
6. If we are satisfied with a council’s actions or proposed actions, we can complete our investigation and issue a decision statement. (Local Government Act 1974, section 30(1B) and 34H(i), as amended)

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How I considered this complaint

7. I considered Miss X’s complaint and the information she provided. We asked the Council for information and considered its response to the complaint.
8. Miss X, her representative and the Council had an opportunity to comment on my draft decision. I considered the comments received before making a final decision.

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What I found

2019

9. In March 2019 Miss X complained to the Council. She stated she had been living with anti-social behaviour and noise from her neighbour for ten years. She stated it was impacting her mental health and that of her son. Her son has been diagnosed with Asperger’s.
10. Miss X stated over the years the Council’s Environmental Health team had been involved and she had raised issues with the police, her MP and solicitors. She stated on each occasion she felt the various people who had considered the matter had justified her neighbour’s behaviour and her feelings and mental health difficulties were ignored. Miss X stated that when noise equipment had been installed at her property in the past, it had not picked up a lot of the noise she experienced as it was sudden noises such as loud bangs, thumps, knocking and shouting. She also complained about a barking dog.
11. In April 2019 a housing officer contacted Miss X and discussed the issues. They wrote to her neighbour to make them aware issues had been reported and they asked Miss X to keep diaries of the noise she was experiencing.
12. The Council stated that a referral was made to its Environmental Health Team (EH) in June 2019. Their records show they wrote to Miss X and to her neighbour. The EH team received diary sheets detailing the noise from Miss X in August 2019
13. In early September the EH team sent a second letter to both Miss X and her neighbour about the noise issue. It told Miss X she would be contacted by an external contractor for noise monitoring equipment to be installed. The Council acknowledged that due to an error it did not install noise monitoring equipment. The 2019 complaint appears to have been closed. No further action was taken.
14. There is no record to show what the EH team made of the noise diaries Miss X submitted or how it decided to close the 2019 complaint. So, it seems evident that the Council’s EH team did not properly consider Miss X’s 2019 noise complaint.
15. In October 2019 Miss X made a further complaint about noise to Housing Officers. During the same time period Miss X’s neighbours made some counter allegations about Miss X’s behaviour. There were a number of further visits by the Housing Team in late 2019/early 2020 which are not relevant to my consideration of the noise complaints by Environmental Health.

2020

16. The Council provided us with copies of a log that Miss X sent to the Council in respect of a new complaint about noise and anti-social behaviour made on 23 June 2020. The Council says its officers asked Miss X to keep the log. The log is extensive and mainly notes incidents of noise from Miss X’s neighbours.
17. The Council‘s EH team told us it opened another noise complaint investigation in June 2020. This appears to have been a referral from housing. The EH team spoke to Miss X. It wrote to Miss X and to her neighbour. It also sent Miss X noise monitoring sheets to complete. It stated on this occasion no diary sheets were returned, so it took no further action and the complaint did not progress further.
18. While the EH diary sheets had not been returned, Miss X was continuing to complete a log of noise issues for the housing team. Miss X appears to have started the log in July 2020 and she continued to complete it until the end of the year. It runs to many pages and sets out many references to noise, the time this occurred and what the noise sounded like.
19. The Council stated that housing officers had received and analysed the information and sent a verbal and written warning to her neighbour. However, as in 2019, there seems to have been little or no communication between housing and Environmental Health. Environmental Health did not take the 2020 complaint further because it did not receive noise diaries, yet Miss X was completing an extensive diary of events about noise and sending this to the housing team.

Was there fault by the Council

20. I cannot investigate or comment on Housing Officers’ actions in relation to Miss X’s complaints. They sent me information which shows they were acting on behalf of the Council in its capacity as a Landlord. We do not have the jurisdiction to investigate the actions of registered social housing providers.
21. However, I have considered whether the Council properly investigated the noise complaints using its powers under the Environmental Protection Act 1990. I found, in this regard, there was fault by the Council.
22. In 2019, due to an oversight, the EH team did not install noise monitoring equipment or come to a view on whether the issues Miss X reported constituted a statutory nuisance. There seems to have been poor co-ordination between Housing Officers and Environmental Health. Had there been better communication, the omission by EH could have been identified and rectified.
23. In 2020, Miss X completed logs for the Housing team detailing issues with her neighbour. These logs are dominated by references to noise.
24. The Council suggested Miss X was not disadvantaged because of the failure to carry out the 2019 investigation because she had access to the Council’s out of hours service and did not use this. However, it is evident from the information Miss X provided in diary sheets in 2019 (and provided to Housing Officers in 2020) that many of the noise incidents she complained of, occurred during the daytime, not out of hours. So, the fact that this service was not used was not significant in my view. It is by no means clear that a statutory nuisance was occurring, but Miss X is left with some uncertainty about whether any action would have been taken had the Council installed equipment in 2019 and because the 2020 investigation ceased. In each case there seems no proper decision taken about the noise she reported. This undoubtedly caused Miss X frustration and it was part of the reason she continued to spend time pursing her complaint. As a result, I consider she suffered an injustice and a remedy is warranted.

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Agreed action

25. Within four weeks:
26. The Council agreed to make a payment to Miss X of £250 to recognise there was a degree of uncertainty about the outcome of the Environmental Health Team’s consideration of her noise complaints in 2019 and 2020. This payment also recognises the time and trouble she was put to in pursuing her complaint.
27. The Council agreed to review how the Housing Team and Environmental Health teams work together and share information in the light of Miss X’s complaint. It should take action to ensure that information is shared appropriately and the teams work together better for their mutual benefit and for the benefit of citizens.

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Final decision

28. There was fault by the Council.

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Parts of the complaint that I did not investigate

29. The law generally requires complaints to be brought to us within 12 months of someone knowing about the issues subject to complaint. We have investigated the way the Council addressed noise and anti-social behaviour reports from January 2019. Although Miss X’s complaint to the Council referenced events going back ten years, the older events Miss X references are too old for us to investigate now. The older events of Miss X’s complaint fall outside our jurisdiction.
30. The Housing Ombudsman exists to consider complaints about the actions of Registered Social Housing Providers. The Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman has no jurisdiction to consider the actions of the Council, acting as a landlord.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman