Summary: Mr and Mrs X complain the Council poorly handled their application to move house when they were suffering alleged anti-social behaviour from their neighbours. We do not find the Council at fault.

The complaint

1. The complainants complain they suffered anti-social abuse from neighbours, but the Council failed to adjust their housing band and help them relocate.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

2. 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)
3. We investigate complaints of injustice caused by ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’. I have used the word ‘fault’ to refer to these. We cannot question whether a council’s decision is right or wrong simply because the complainant disagrees with it. We must consider whether there was fault in the way the decision was reached. (Local Government Act 1974, section 34(3), as amended)
4. 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)

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How I considered this complaint

5. I spoke with Mr X and reviewed the documents provided by the Council regarding this complaint. I reviewed Council policy and the relevant guidance.

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What I found

The Council’s Housing Allocation Scheme Policy (HASP)

6. The Council allocates housing using HASP, which sets out who can apply for social housing in the area and how the priorities are set and assessments made. Certain groups of people are prioritized, such as:

• homeless people
• those living in overcrowded housing or unsatisfactory housing conditions.
• those who need to move on medical or welfare grounds, or on grounds relating to disability, and
• those who need to move to a particular locality in the Council’s area where failure to meet that need would cause hardship (to themselves or to others).

7. Council policy says it is committed to promoting equal opportunities, ensuring nominations are made in a non-discriminatory way.
8. With certain exceptions, anyone wishing to apply to join the Council’s housing register has to demonstrate a local connection to the area. A local connection is established through residence, employment, family associations or special circumstances.
9. Once an application is assessed it is placed in either the Emergency Band or one of four bands, lettered A-D, according to the severity of ‘reasonable preference’ and the applicant’s housing needs.
10. Emergency band applicants include those the Council has accepted as homeless, those with a local connection who are unable to be discharged from hospital until suitable housing is found and those who have been subject to a Multi-Agency review and where it is considered that emergency housing is required. The highest bidder is awarded in priority in descending order between the emergency group and Bands A to D. Below, I have summarised some of the relevant information pertaining to Band C and B, to show the differences in scale of need between the relevant bandings.
11. Band C is for those who are in ‘general need’. This includes applicants with a moderate medical award or moderate welfare award. It also covers those who require one ‘additional’, (see para 13).

• A moderate medical award is where it is considered that the applicant is able to manage in the current property, but it is likely that over time, difficulties will arise which are likely to impact upon their ability to remain independent.
• A moderate welfare award is where the current property moderately limits access to necessary care/support for a member of the household. Quality of life is moderately impaired by the current facilities.

12. Band B includes those applicants who have an urgent medical award or who need two or more additional bedrooms, among other requirements.

• An urgent medical award describes a situation where at the current time the property is likely to result in access difficulties for the applicant/carer in the long term if accommodation is not secured. It also refers to where the ability of the client to remain independent at home in the long term is not sustainable. For example, an applicant is known to present with a long-term degenerative health condition which is currently being managed but not practical in the long term.
• An urgent welfare award includes situations where a person is recovering from drug or alcohol dependency, a person who requires care and support, such as a young adult with learning disabilities, a situation where there is an essential need for the applicant or their carer to relocate to live near a close relative.

13. An applicant is deemed to have ‘additional need’ if he/she has housing need arising from two or more reasonable preferences. This additional need takes the form of ‘stars’. The star will allow a person to be considered above others in their band with no stars. The stars are awarded for medical or welfare reasons or for unsatisfactory accommodation.
14. As there is a shortage of large homes in certain locations, applicants can bid for smaller accommodation if they prefer.

Government guidance for councils on responses to anti-social behaviour

15. The guidance says that the response to anti-social behaviour may require collaborative working between different agencies to determine the most appropriate solution. It says that where a report or complaint is made to one agency, that lead agency should consider the potential role of others in providing a solution if they are not themselves able to take action. (Reform of anti-social behaviour powers: statutory guidance for frontline professionals)

Anti-social behaviour – Council’s Service Standards

16. The Council says it will ensure victims are at the centre of its response to anti-social behaviour. It says, among other things, that:

• Each complaint will be investigated and taken seriously
• A risk assessment will be completed to help identify vulnerable and repeat victims
• The victim will be informed who the lead organisation will be and will be provide with appropriate support. The lead organisation will work with partners and other service providers where necessary.
• The Council will promote another route if a complainant is not satisfied with the outcome.

17. The Council says it chairs Hate and Anti-social Behaviour Action Group meetings. The Association attends these meetings with the police and housing officers. It says environmental health officers’ cases are discussed and recorded.
18. In response to our enquiries the Council says that in some ways the area’s Community Safety Partnership is a “gestalt entity with the actions of one standing for all the others.” It says that otherwise it would mean more than one agency were duplicating investigations into allegations when this wasn’t necessary.

The Council’s Local connection policy

19. All housing applicants have to have a local connection to the district, except for those who are homeless, fleeing violence, in the armed forces or care leavers. The Council has agreements, called Section 106 agreements, with housing providers. There are a number of different agreements, each specifying different requirements for local connections to the district. Different agreements put local connections in different order of priority. Tenants who meet the criteria set out in the agreement and have a relevant local connection, must be considered before other people with housing needs.

Background facts

20. Mr and Mrs X say that for the past few years they have suffered anti-social abuse from their neighbours.
21. They are a vulnerable family, suffering from autism, Asperger’s syndrome, dyspraxia and dyslexia.
22. The family complained to their housing association, (the Association), about anti-social behaviour in 2017. The Council says the Community Safety Team, police and other agencies became involved. It says the police were called several times and after the case was closed in February 2017, it appears there was an assault and criminal damage, which were investigated by the police.
23. The family were living in a three-bedroomed house, to accommodate their children. They were overcrowded and in need of one more bedroom. They had been living at the accommodation since August 2011, when they made an application in May 2017 to be moved.
24. They asked to be moved because of:

• Neighbour problems
• Social reasons
• To give support to relatives, and
• Their current property was too small.
• They said they had a local connection to the area.
• They said they were victims of harassment/anti-social behaviour

25. They said their children had to move schools because, for a period of two and half years, they were harassed by neighbours. They said hate crimes were committed against them which had a severe impact on their wellbeing. They reported the hate crimes to the police but said they were told there was nothing the police could do. Mr X says he made a complaint about the police’s handling of their case.
26. Mr X said the housing association, whose property they were living in, did not support them. Mr and Mrs X provided supporting evidence that their family were going through a difficult time. They provided copies of Early Help Assessment reviews, detailing the support that was being provided to the family from a social care perspective and the support that professionals felt was needed.
27. In the review notes, a note was made in June 2016 saying housing and difficulties with neighbours was causing ‘huge anxiety’ for the whole family.
28. One of the reviews showed that professionals felt Mrs X needed support with her anxiety and the situation with the house and their neighbours ‘needed addressing’.
29. The Council says that in May 2018 the Community Safety Team visited the family home. It says the following was agreed:
1. For the family to either phone in or to report online (which the Council says they did not do.)
2. Mr X to consider getting a ‘keep safe card’ due to his condition. The Council says he has not done this.
3. To speak to their GP and Social Services for a report to be completed on their health and for this to be forwarded to housing in support of a requested house move.
30. In August 2018, Mr and Mrs X complained to the Council that because of the difficulties they were having with their neighbours and because of the impact on their children, the Council should place the family in a higher housing band. They were in Band C.
31. The Council says they were awarded Band C as it was assessed that the family needed an extra bedroom. The Council say they were also given a moderate medical award with an additional star for welfare issues because of information the complainants provided about their children’s health.
32. Mr X said the Council said they could not move from Band C because they did not have a local connection to the district. However, the couple said all their children went to school in the area. They also said Mr X had been brought up and schooled in the area. They said the Council repeatedly put other people before them and was discriminating against them for some unknown reason.
33. In September 2018 Mrs X wrote to the Council. She said her children were being stalked and harassed. She said they could not play in the garden and the family were being abused on a daily basis. She asked:

“Surely if the abuse is ongoing and getting more and more intense if not for the safety of us surely the social care of our children should be taken into account.”

34. The Council says it accepts Mrs X has a local connection to the area. It says it did not discriminate against Mr or Mrs X. I have seen evidence showing other applicants were given housing instead of Mr and Mrs X but in each instance, there were reasons the complainants were not successful in their bidding. Although Mr and Mrs X had a local connection, when they applied for housing, for various reasons, they did not have as strong a local connection as others or, on one occasion, the housing association reported that the couple did not engage with the process.
35. The Council responded to Mr and Mrs X’s application for a change in banding, saying:

• Mr X needed to take up his complaints about his neighbours with the complaints officer at the housing association, (“the association”), where his neighbours were tenants.
• The Council accepted Mr X said his family were vulnerable and this had been considered when reviewing the medical self-assessment form. It said when the completed forms are returned to the housing department, they are mainly assessed by the Council’s medical liaison officer, who considers the information provided against the housing allocations scheme. (In complaint correspondence the Council has said the medical liaison officer did not assess the medical information provided in this case. Instead, the officer passed the file to the housing team to investigate the allegations of anti-social behavior.)
• Mr X was awarded Band C moderate medical award and an additional star for welfare issues.
• The Council had not said Mr X did not have a local connection. But, when applying for properties with a s106 criteria applied to them, it has to work with the individual undertakings and planning conditions within that document. Attendance by children at a local school does not count as a local connection in the type of property Mr X was looking at.
• Mr X was not being discriminated against. The Council said he had been nominated for housing association vacancies numerous times.

36. The file shows the housing options manager stated she had considered all the information in Mr X’s application and made the above recommendation.
37. In another letter sent shortly afterwards from the Housing department, the Council sought to assure Mr X that while the Council could not take his children’s schools into account when making an assessment, it had taken his children’s welfare into account and that was why he had been awarded Band C with a star for welfare.
38. Mr and Mrs X asked for their complaint to be considered at stage 2. They stressed that they felt they should have been placed in an emergency band because of the hate crimes they said they had been victim of. They described a number of incidents and stressed again that the safety of their children should be taken into account.
39. The Council responded, saying:

• It had taken all their circumstances into account when determining the band.
• Mr and Mrs X should report anti-social behaviour incidents to the police and to the Association as it was the Council’s understanding there was no anti-social behaviour case open at the time.

40. On 31 October 2018 Mr X’s GP wrote to the housing department, supporting Mr and Mrs X’s application for a four bedroom house in an area near their childrens’ school. The doctor detailed the same incidents Mr X had described to the Council before.
41. The Council has given me a copy of Mr X’s GP letter. It is stamped 8 November 2018. I presume that is the date it was received in Council offices. A note, dated 19 November 2018, written on the face of the letter, says: “Currently Band C. Please request further information from [the Association] of on-going neighbour problems.” The Council says this note was written by the Council’s Medical Liaison Officer.
42. The records show the Council contacted the Association.
43. On 18 December 2018 the Council’s housing options department wrote to Mr X. It said it contacted the housing association to enquire about the alleged harassment. However, it was told there was no current complaint open and the original complaint had been closed with the support of the police.
44. It suggested Mr X contact his housing association again to raise a complaint and keep a log of incidents.
45. It added that if Mr X did not feel the association was responsive, he should contact the Council’s environment health department.
46. When I spoke to Mr X on the phone he told me that he had not made an anti-social behaviour complaint.
47. Since bringing his complaint to the Ombudsman, the Council has informed me Mr X and his family have been re-housed.

Analysis

48. Councils should investigate allegations of anti-social behaviour. In this instance, the Council made enquiries with the Association to see if Mr X had made a complaint about the issues he and his family said they were experiencing. When it found that the complaint file had been closed for some time on the case, it told Mr X to raise any complaint with the Association and if the Association was not responsive, to come back to the Council and make a complaint with its environmental health team. I consider it was reasonable for it to take this approach. The Association had taken a lead in investigating historical anti-social complaints made by Mr X. If Mr X had made an anti-social complaint with the Council’s environmental health team and this had been ignored, I would take a different view. However, Mr X has told me that he did not make an anti-social complaint with the Council. I do not find fault.
49. I do not find the Council’s decision to place the family in Band C to be unreasonable. Mr X says he and his family found the situation they were in intolerable, but that was linked to their allegations about the alleged anti-social behaviour. As they did not pursue these complaints through either the Association or the environmental health team, it is understandable if the Council considered the issues they complained of were not serious enough to raise the level of their banding to either Band B or to the Emergency band.
50. That is not to say that Mr and Mrs X’s circumstances were not difficult. The evidence indicates the family were finding their situation very trying, but consideration of this was reflected in the particular banding and star rating they were allocated.
51. Mr X also says the police failed to investigate properly. I cannot look at that and Mr X has a complaint against the police.

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Final decision

52. I have not found the Council at fault. I have completed my investigation.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman