Summary: We will not investigate this complaint about the refusal of a ‘right to buy’ application. It is reasonable to expect Mrs X to take court action.

The complaint

1. Mrs X complains the Council wrongly refused her application to buy her home.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

2. The law says we cannot normally investigate a complaint when someone could take the matter to court. However, we may decide to investigate if we consider it would be unreasonable to expect the person to go to court. (Local Government Act 1974, section 26(6)(c), as amended)

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How I considered this complaint

3. I considered information provided by the complainant and copy correspondence from the Council.
4. I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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My assessment

5. The Council refused Mrs X’s application to buy her home under the ‘right to buy.’ The Council said this was because the application had included a person who was ineligible because they were not a member of Mrs X’s family and had not lived in the property for the required period. Mrs X argues the person is a member of her family and met the residency requirement. She is unhappy the Council did not either agree with her or remove the other person from her application then continue with the application. The Council said if Mrs X wanted to apply to buy her home without the other person on the application, she must make a new application. However, since Mrs X’s application, the government has changed the ‘right to buy’ discount rules. So, if Mrs X were to make a new application, she could only receive a smaller discount, which would make buying her home more expensive.
6. The law allows the county court to decide any dispute about the 'right to buy' except for disputes about the valuation of property (valuation is not relevant to this complaint). (Housing Act 1985, section 181) So the restriction in paragraph 2 applies to this complaint.
7. As the law expressly provides this route for resolving such disputes, we normally expect applicants to use it, with legal advice if necessary. The court could decide whether the person was entitled to be on the application and whether the Council should proceed with Mrs X’s original application under the old discount rules. There might be some cost to court action, but that alone does not automatically make taking court action unreasonable, particularly in the context of a transaction for a valuable asset such as Mrs X's home. The court could also make a binding order if it saw fit, which the Ombudsman could not. For these reasons, it is reasonable to expect Mrs X to use the right to go to court.

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Final decision

8. We will not investigate Mrs X’s complaint because it is reasonable to expect her to use her right to take court action.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman