Summary: we did not find fault in the way the Council decided to remove Mr Y from the Housing Register or in the way it considered his request for a review of the decision. There is some ambiguity in the Council’s housing allocations policy about its medical assessment procedure but this fault did not cause injustice to Mr Y.

The complaint

1. Mr X made this complaint on behalf of Mr Y with his written consent.
2. Mr X complained about the Council’s decision to remove Mr Y from the Housing Register on the grounds he had no housing need and no longer qualified. He also complained about the way the Review Officer considered his request for a review of this decision.
3. Following his removal from the Housing Register, Mr Y could not bid for social housing advertised on the Council’s choice-based lettings scheme (“Choice Homes”). Mr X says Mr Y’s current studio flat is unsuitable for two reasons: on medical grounds and because he has experienced repeated incidents of anti-social behaviour (ASB) from neighbours. He wants the Council to reinstate Mr Y’s application on the Housing Register, award medical priority and pay compensation.

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What I have investigated

4. I have investigated the way the Council reached the decision to remove Mr Y from the Housing Register in May 2021 and its subsequent review of the decision to remove him from the Register.
5. I did not investigate the actions of officers in the Council’s housing management service for the reasons given in paragraphs 7 and 53.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

6. 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 an organisation’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)
7. 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)
8. If we are satisfied with an organisation’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

9. I have spoken to Mr X and considered the information he provided.
10. I considered the Council’s response to my enquiries and the relevant housing records.
11. Mr X and the council had an opportunity to comment on my draft decision. I considered their comments before making a final decision.

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What I found

The relevant law – housing allocations

12. Every local housing authority must publish an allocations scheme that sets out how it prioritises applicants, and its procedures for allocating housing.  All allocations must be made in strict accordance with the published scheme. (Housing Act 1996, section 166A(1) & (14))
13. An allocations scheme must give reasonable preference to applicants in the following categories:

• homeless people;
• people in insanitary, overcrowded or unsatisfactory housing;
• people who need to move on medical or welfare grounds;
• people who need to move to avoid hardship to themselves or others;
  (Housing Act 1996, section 166A(3))
   

14. Councils must notify an applicant in writing of a decision that they are not entitled to a reasonable preference and/or that they do not qualify to join the Housing Register. They must give reasons for the decision and notify the applicant of the right to request a review of the decision. (Housing Act 1996, section 166A(9))
     

Redbridge Council’s housing allocations scheme

15. The Council introduced its current housing allocations scheme in 2017. To qualify to join the Housing Register, the applicant must satisfy the following criteria:
• be at least 16 years old; and
• meet the residence requirements by having lived in the borough continuously for at least five years (with some specified exemptions).

The applicant must also:

• meet the criteria for Band 1, 2 or 3 priority (see below); OR
• be an armed forces applicant; OR
• be accepted as an applicant for sheltered housing.
3. Qualifying applicants are placed in one of four priority bands based on their housing needs:

Band 1 – emergency – tenants who must be moved urgently due to estate regeneration schemes; emergencies and management transfers; an applicant who cannot be discharged from hospital due to not having suitable accommodation.

Band 2 – urgent – this includes several categories of housing need, including urgent medical need;

Band 3 – priority – this includes several categories, including medical need;

Band 4 – reduced priority – sheltered housing applicants; homeless households who are not owed a housing duty; applicants for shared or low cost home ownership and other applicants who are entitled to a reasonable preference but do not meet the residence requirements.

17. The policy explains how requests for medical priority are assessed. Medical priority is not awarded simply because someone has a serious medical condition or disability. The current accommodation must adversely affect the person’s medical condition or disability or not meet their essential needs arising from their medical condition or disability.
18. Applicants who apply for priority on medical grounds must complete an online medical assessment form and provide any supporting evidence they want the Council to consider. The policy says:

“The onus is on the applicant to provide the information we need to complete the assessment; the Council will not routinely make its own enquiries, other than to seek advice from the Council’s Housing Medical Advisor (CHMA). Information provided by the CHMA is advice only and the decision whether to award priority or not will be taken by a relevant officer within the Housing Service. Where insufficient information has been provided to complete an assessment, the Council will advise the applicant of the further information required.”

19. The policy says the Council will notify the applicant of its decision on medical priority within eight weeks. The applicant may request a review of the decision.
20. The Council will close an existing application if the applicant no longer meets the qualifying criteria due to a change in circumstances.

Mr Y’s circumstances

21. Mr Y is a single man. He is a Council tenant and lives in a studio flat on the second floor of a block with no lift.
22. Mr Y has chronic health conditions which cause pain in his shoulder, spine, hip and knee and limit his mobility. He is under the care of the orthopaedic team at a local hospital. He receives a Personal Independence Payment (PIP) which includes an enhanced mobility component.
23. Mr Y has been diagnosed with mental health conditions for which his GP has prescribed medication. He is supported by a senior social worker based in a mental health team at the local NHS Trust. He also has a support worker from an organisation that works with single people in housing need.
24. Mr Y reported repeated incidents of ASB by neighbours to the housing management service over many years. Mr Y reported verbal abuse, threatening behaviour, an assault and criminal damage to his property. He wants to move closer to family members who live outside London.

Mr X’s Housing Register application

25. The Council accepted Mr Y’s application to join the Housing Register in October 2016. This was before the current housing allocations scheme was introduced in 2017. Mr Y was in the studio flat then and was accepted as a tenant seeking a transfer. When the Council introduced the new allocations scheme in 2017, Mr Y was in Band 4 – the lowest priority band.
26. In October 2020 the Housing Service reviewed Mr Y’s application. Mr X sent in medical evidence on Mr Y’s behalf. Officer A decided this was not sufficient to award medical priority. She contacted Mr Y in mid-October to ask him to submit more evidence from mental health services.
27. In early November Officer A responded to an enquiry from a senior social worker in the NHS mental health team which supports Mr Y. Officer A requested a report about Mr Y’s mental health needs and the services he received.
28. The senior social worker visited Mr Y in early December 2020. She then contacted Officer A to ask whether Mr Y could bid for properties and his housing status. Officer A replied that, as a Council tenant who was adequately housed, Mr Y would not usually qualify to be on the Housing Register. However the Council had previously accepted his application and awarded reduced priority due to his circumstances. She gave no further explanation.
29. In mid-December 2020 the senior social worker confirmed in a letter that Mr X had anxiety, depression and insomnia. She said his anxiety was triggered by noise disturbance and ASB by neighbours. She said the treatment plan was for him to engage in psychological therapy and community-based activities to promote social inclusion.
30. The senior social worker wrote a further letter in mid-March 2021 asking the Council to review his current housing priority. She said Mr X had reported the ASB incidents had escalated and he felt victimised and threatened by his neighbours. She said he had been physically attacked.
31. Officer A consulted her manager to ask if this warranted Band 3 medical priority. The manager advised it was not sufficient and the housing management service should investigate and deal with any ASB issues.
32. Before making a decision, Officer A contacted an officer in the housing management service to enquire about the ASB. The housing management officer told Officer A that Mr X had not reported any ASB incidents in the past year.
33. On 21 May 2021 Mr X emailed a letter to Officer A which confirmed Mr Y had been awarded a Personal Independence Payment (PIP) which included an enhanced mobility component. Mr X sent the two page summary which sets out Mr Y’s score for the mobility component. It said his walking ability is limited to 50-200 metres due to pain and balance issues. It did not comment on his ability to manage stairs.
34. Three days later Officer A decided Mr Y was not in housing need and therefore he did not qualify to be on the Housing Register. His application was closed and he was removed from the Register. The letter informed Mr Y of his right to request a review of this decision.
35. Mr X promptly requested a review of the decision. He said he intended to make further written representations. The Council acknowledged his request and said it was due to make the review decision by 5 August.
36. In June 2021 Mr Y’s support worker wrote to the Council in support of the review request. Among other things, he made the point that the PIP award letter gave details of Mr X’s mobility needs. It explained Mr Y’s mobility was compromised by pain in his spine from a shoulder injury and a medical condition which affected his balance and caused vertigo. He could only manage to walk about 50-200 metres around his home using walls and furniture for support.
37. The Council agreed to Mr X’s request for more time to send in further evidence. In early September Mr X sent a substantial amount of evidence, including medical records and video recordings and images of ASB incidents. He made detailed representations and set out the full history of ASB and the response from the Council’s housing management service.
38. The Review Officer considered this evidence and made a decision on 15 October 2021. He upheld the original decision that Mr Y was not in housing need and therefore did not qualify for the Housing Register. His letter lists all the evidence he considered. He summarised the key points in the review request. He responded to the points made about the impact of ASB on Mr Y’s mental health and the suitability of the accommodation for Mr Y with regard to his physical and mental health needs.
39. In terms of Mr Y’s mobility needs, the Review Officer said there were no internal stairs in his flat. He noted Mr Y’s flat was on the second floor and that Mr Y suffered some intermittent vertigo and difficulties with balance and co-ordination. However he did not consider the floor level of the property made it unsuitable for Mr Y due to his physical health needs.
40. A few days after the Review Officer made his decision, Mr Y’s neighbour was arrested by the police for making threats to kill Mr Y. The bail conditions banned him from contacting Mr Y or going to his flat. Two months later the neighbour was convicted of a public order offence: causing harassment, alarm and distress and using threatening or abusive words. The neighbour has since moved out of the flat. It is important to note that this particular incident, and the neighbour’s arrest and conviction, happened after the Review Officer had made his decision.
41. In my enquiries to the Council, I asked if it had referred Mr Y’s case to the CMHA to seek advice on whether he met the criteria for medical priority before making the original decision or the review decision. It told me officers had not done that. I also asked if the Council’s policy could be interpreted to mean a referral should usually be made to the CMHA when an application requests medical priority.
42. The Council accepted that the section of its policy which deals with referrals to the CMHA could have been worded more clearly. It said officers do not refer every case to the CHMA when an applicant raises medical issues. It says this would be unnecessary and costly. It does not usually make enquiries and relies on the applicant to provide information they want to be considered rather making its own enquiries. Officers will ask the CHMA for advice when they consider that is necessary.

My analysis

43. The Council was entitled to review whether Mr Y was still in housing need, as defined in its housing allocations policy, and to remove him from the Housing Register if it decided he no longer qualified. Significantly, the allocations policy had changed since Mr Y joined the Housing Register in 2016. Under the 2017 policy, applicants with Band 4 priority no longer qualify to be on the Housing Register (the two exceptions in paragraph 15 did not apply to Mr Y).
44. Officer A had to decide if Mr Y met the criteria for medical priority under Band 2 or 3. She focused on whether he was in housing need because his accommodation was having an adverse impact on his mental health. At that point, the senior social worker had confirmed Mr Y’s mental health conditions and the proposed treatment plan. Officer A considered two recent letters from the senior social worker, along with other medical evidence, and the impact of the ASB on his mental health.
45. I considered whether Officer A should have considered Mr Y’s mobility needs and not focused solely on his mental health. Mr X sent the two page summary in the PIP award letter to Officer A three days before she made the decision. This confirmed Mr Y had been awarded the enhanced mobility component and could walk between 50 and 200 metres. I have not seen evidence that Mr X, or the senior social worker, specifically reported Mr Y’s difficulties managing the stairs to his flat before Officer A made the decision in May 2021. I am therefore likely to find Officer A did not know about Mr Y’s specific difficulties with the stairs at that time. For this reason, she focused on the impact of the ASB on Mr Y’s mental health.
46. Mr X used the review procedure to challenge Officer A’s decision. He made very detailed written representations to the Reviews Officer and provided a large number of documents and other evidence. The review decision letter gives a detailed analysis of the key issues. The Reviews Officer considered evidence relating to the ASB incidents, and medical evidence about Mr Y’s mental and physical health, including his mobility needs.
47. We cannot criticise the merits of a review decision if we find no fault in the way it was made. Mr X strongly disagrees with the review outcome because he considers there was compelling evidence that Mr Y met the criteria for medical priority. But I see no fault in the way the review decision was made. The Review Officer properly considered all the evidence, set out his analysis, and gave reasons for his decision.
48. The law says councils must make decisions in strict accordance with their published housing allocations scheme. The Council’s policy does not explain, in sufficiently clear terms, its procedure for medical assessments. It begins with a statement that the onus is on the applicant to provide evidence for the assessment. That is very clear. It then says that the Council will not routinely make its own enquiries, other than to seek advice from the CMHA. That sentence is rather confusing. One interpretation is that the Council will routinely make enquiries to the CMHA, but not routinely make other enquiries. “Routinely” means ‘regularly following a sequence of actions’. That is not the same as making enquiries in every case or even most of the time. So I have concluded that the current wording gives officers discretion to decide whether to seek advice from the CMHA on a case by case basis. But the lack of clarity in the wording may be confusing for applicants who may expect officers to make a referral to the CMHA more often than not.
49. The lack of clarity and precision in the wording is fault. The Council has agreed to review this section to clarify the medical assessment procedure. This will help applicants understand the process and ensure consistency in decision-making.
50. However this lack of clarity did not cause injustice to Mr Y. The current wording does not require a referral to be made to the CMHA in every case when an applicant requests medical priority. So officers did not depart from the published policy when they did not seek advice from the CMHA on Mr Y’s medical needs.

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Final decision

51. I have completed the investigation and found the lack of clarity in the medical assessment section of the housing allocations policy is fault. But that did not cause injustice to Mr Y.
52. I have not found fault with the way the Council reached the decision to remove Mr Y from the Housing Register or in the way it made the review decision.

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Parts of the complaint that I did not investigate

53. I did not investigate:
• the actions of the housing management officers who were responsible for investigating the ASB incidents Mr Y reported;
• whether a housing management officer gave Officer A inaccurate information about the history of ASB and the lack of recent incidents;
• whether housing management officers should have considered an emergency management transfer for Mr Y due to the ASB incidents.

These concern the Council’s role as Mr Y’s landlord and the management of social housing. We cannot investigate these matters for the reasons given in paragraph 7.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman