Summary: We will not investigate this complaint about the complainant’s priority on the housing register. This is because there is insufficient evidence of injustice.

The complaint

1. The complainant, whom I refer to as Ms X, complains the Council has not properly assessed her priority on the housing register. She says it ignored a medical report she submitted about her child’s health.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

2. We investigate complaints about ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’, which we call ‘fault’. We must also consider whether any fault has had an adverse impact on the person making the complaint, which we call ‘injustice’. We provide a free service, but must use public money carefully. We do not start an investigation if we decide any fault has not caused injustice to the person who complained. (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended, section 34(B))

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How I considered this complaint

3. I considered information provided by Ms X and the Council. This includes the medical evidence and assessments for medical priority. I also considered our Assessment Code.

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My assessment

4. Ms X is on the housing register. She applied for medical priority; she says her home is unsuitable for her medical needs and those of her child. She submitted medical evidence including a medical report for her child.
5. The Council assessed the application and awarded band C medical for Ms X and her child. There was a comment in the decision that she could ask for a reassessment when an assessment for her child had been completed. In response Ms X said the report she had submitted was the finished assessment for her child.
6. The Council apologised and said it would review the decision. The Council did another review, and considered the completed report, and again awarded band C for Ms X and her child. Ms X remains dissatisfied with the band C award.
7. I will not investigate this complaint because there is insufficient evidence of injustice. The Council had the completed report for the first review and should have taken it into account. However, it rectified this error by doing a second review and considering all the evidence. The Council did not increase the priority following the second review so the initial error did not cause injustice to Ms X.
8. I appreciate Ms X thinks she should have higher priority but it is not my role to decide which band she should be in on the housing register. I can only consider if there was fault in the way the Council made the decision. There was an error in the processing of the first review but nothing to indicate fault in the way it considered the second review; it considered all the evidence and assessed that evidence in relation to the allocations policy. We do not act as an appeal body and cannot tell the Council to move Ms X or place her in a higher band.

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Final decision

9. We will not investigate this complaint because there is insufficient evidence of injustice.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman