Summary: We will not investigate this complaint about the Council’s assessment of a housing application. There is insufficient evidence of fault which would warrant an investigation.

The complaint

1. Miss X complained about the Council’s assessment of her housing application. She believes that she should qualify for Band 1 on the housing register due to medical conditions caused by dampness in her social rented home. The Council says she does not qualify for Band 1 despite having had two reviews of her case. She says her housing association landlord cannot resolve the disrepair and has asked the Council to give her higher priority.

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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)
3. 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)
4. 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)

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How I considered this complaint

5. I considered the information provided by the complainant and the Council. I have also considered the Council’s housing allocations policy.
6. I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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My assessment

7. Miss X says she has been asking the Council to give her housing application the highest banding on medical grounds since 2021. She is a housing association tenant and says that there are disrepair problems which have led to her family suffering medical conditions as a result. Her social housing landlord has told her it cannot carry out further work and that the Council should give her higher priority in recognition of this.
8. We cannot consider the issues back to 2021 because it was reasonable for Miss to complain to us at the time. I have considered the two reviews carried out in the past 12 months from 2023 and 2024 under s.166A of the Housing Act 1996. The Council has considered Miss X’s medical evidence on both occasions and does not believe that she meets the threshold for medical priority. It also says that in the recent investigation her home was inspected by environmental protection officers and that no category 1 hazards were identified under the HHSRS disrepair criteria of the Housing Act 2004.
9. The Council has on both occasions advised Miss X to seek a solution from her landlord because it has powers to decant her temporarily from the property in order to complete repairs required without giving up her tenancy. If the Council had to provide temporary accommodation under homelessness legislation she would lose her current housing banding and could not retain her tenancy if the property was uninhabitable.
10. Because the request for rehousing results from disrepair by a social housing landlord it would be reasonable for Miss X to make a complaint to the Housing Ombudsman service if the landlord is failing to address disrepair or to offer her alternative accommodation whilst it carries out repairs.

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Final decision

11. We will not investigate this complaint about the Council’s assessment of a housing application. There is insufficient evidence of fault which would warrant an investigation.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman