Summary: We will not investigate this complaint about the Council’s decision not to take further action over noise nuisance reported by Mrs X. there is insufficient evidence of fault which would warrant an investigation.

The complaint

1. Mrs X complained about the Council’s failure to take enforcement action over noise from tenants of the flat above hers.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

2. We investigate complaints of injustice caused by ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’. I have used the word fault to refer to these. We consider whether there was fault in the way an organisation made its decision. If there was no fault in how the organisation made its decision, we cannot question the outcome. (Local Government Act 1974, section 34(3), as amended)

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How I considered this complaint

3. I considered information provided by the complainant and the Council’s response.
4. I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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My assessment

5. Mrs X says the tenants of the council flat above hers have caused noise nuisance deliberately. She says she has been disturbed by heavy footsteps and stamping early in the morning, washing machine vibration and noise from a pump from the boiler or shower pump. They have refused to mitigate the noise which is clearly audible in her flat and she considers this to be anti-social behaviour.
6. As well as some involvement by the housing authority and the Community Protection Team environmental officers from the noise team were involved. The Council considered her complaints including diary sheets she submitted and recordings on the noise app. The Council concluded that the noise did not qualify as a statutory nuisance because it was domestic noise from everyday activity and domestic appliances.
7. The Environmental Protection Act 1990 places a duty on councils to investigate reports of nuisance and to take reasonable steps to investigate any complaints of statutory nuisance that it receives. If the Council had considered the issue to be a statutory nuisance it would be required to serve an abatement notice.
8. There is no duty to serve a notice if the Council decides there is no statutory nuisance, as in this case. These notices carry a right of appeal to the magistrates court and the resident can appeal if they believe the notice was unreasonable or incorrectly served. This means the Council would have to have a case which could be reasonably defended at appeal and if there is not sufficient evidence it should not serve a notice.
9. The Council told Mrs X that it is likely the noise is more noticeable due to the poor insulation of the building. It has referred this to the social housing landlord. We have no authority to investigate complaints involving housing management by social housing landlords.
10. The Ombudsman is not an appeal body. This means we do not take a second look at a decision to decide if it was wrong. Instead, we look at the processes an organisation followed to make its decision. If we consider it followed those processes correctly, we cannot question whether the decision was right or wrong, regardless of whether someone disagrees with the decision the organisation made.

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Final decision

11. We will not investigate this complaint about the Council’s decision not to take further action over noise nuisance reported by Mrs X. there is insufficient evidence of fault which would warrant an investigation.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman