Summary: We will not exercise discretion to investigate this complaint about the offer of a social housing tenancy to Miss X in 2019. This complaint which was received outside the normal 12-month period for investigating complaints. There is no evidence to suggest that Miss X could not have complained to us sooner. We will not investigate her complaint about her current banding on the housing register. There is insufficient evidence of fault which would warrant an investigation.

The complaint

1. Miss X complained about the allocation of her current housing association home in 2019. She says the property is unsuitable due to anti-social behaviour in the neighbourhood, lack of personal security and poor repairs by the landlord. She applied for rehousing but is currently in a low-priority banding.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

2. 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)
3. 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 the decision making, we cannot question the outcome. (Local Government Act 1974, section 34(3), as amended)

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How I considered this complaint

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

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My assessment

6. Miss X was offered a direct let for a social rented housing flat in 2019. She accepted the tenancy but since then has claimed that it is unsuitable for various reasons. She says she feels unsafe from persons on the estate where there is a lack of security. She also complained about anti-social behaviour and the landlord’s poor response to repairs. In 202 she told the Council she was homeless because she could no longer stay in her flat.
7. The Council concluded that Miss X was not homeless and it also confirmed this at her review of the decision. She later involved her local Member of Parliament but this had no result. It was reasonable for Miss X to complain to us in 2019 or 2020 when she believed her home was unsuitable. However, had she done so we would have advised her at the time of the homeless decision to exercise her right of appeal to the County Court.
8. We cannot consider Miss X’s allegations about anti-social behaviour on the estate or repairs to her home because she is a tenant of a social housing landlord and we have no jurisdiction to investigate. The Housing Ombudsman service is the body which deals with the management of housing by social landlords.
9. Miss X says she is in a low-priority banding for re-housing by the Council. The Council has placed her in band 4 because it considers she is adequately housed in a social housing property of appropriate size. She submitted a medical assessment for her application but the Council’s medical advisors found no additional priority was warranted.
10. The Ombudsman may not find fault with a council’s assessment of a housing application/ a housing applicant’s priority if it has carried this out in line with its published allocations scheme. We recognise that the demand for social housing far outstrips the supply of properties in many areas. We may not find fault with a council for failing to re-house someone, if it has prioritised applicants and allocated properties according to its published lettings scheme policy.

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Final decision

11. We will not exercise discretion to investigate this complaint about the offer of a social housing tenancy to Miss X in 2019. This complaint which was received outside the normal 12-month period for investigating complaints. There is no evidence to suggest that Miss X could not have complained to us sooner. We will not investigate her complaint about her current banding on the housing register. There is insufficient evidence of fault which would warrant an investigation.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman