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

The complaint

1. Miss X complained about the Council’s failure to rehouse her from her existing council home. She says she needs an additional bedroom for one child who has autism and her other child cannot access the upstairs in her home, including the bathroom due to his medical needs.

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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)

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How I considered this complaint

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

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My assessment

5. Miss X is a tenant of the Council and says her home is unsuitable for her family’s needs due to lack of space and her children’s medical requirements. She is on the housing register for a transfer but complained that she has received no offers and her priority is too low.
6. Miss X submitted recent medical information about her children’s needs for a medical assessment before she complained to us. We asked the Council about the outcome of her medical assessment and it sent us the results recently. Miss X now has a higher banding and priority for vacancies with 3 bedrooms and wheelchair accessibility with a level access bathroom and other adaptations.
7. The Council cannot tell Miss X when she will be rehoused because this depends on what vacancies occur and the priority of other applicants on the housing register.
8. The Ombudsman is not an appeal body. This means we do not take a second look at a decision to decide if it was wrong. Instead, we look at the processes an organisation followed to make its decision. If we consider it followed those processes correctly, we cannot question whether the decision was right or wrong, regardless of whether someone disagrees with the decision the organisation made.
9. We 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.

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Final decision

10. We will not investigate this complaint about the Council’s assessment of Miss X’s 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