Summary: the Council was at fault because its service provider did not give Mr X a written decision that he was not eligible for homelessness assistance. He therefore had no opportunity to request a review of that decision. The Council has agreed to provide a suitable remedy.

The complaint

1. Mr X is a young single homeless man. He complains that the Council and its contractor did not give him adequate advice and assistance when he approached them for assistance. He also complains that a member of staff made remarks which he considers to be racist.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

2. We investigate complaints about ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’. In this statement, I have used the word fault to refer to these. We must also consider whether any fault has had an adverse impact on the person making the complaint. I refer to this as ‘injustice’. If there has been fault which has caused an injustice, we may suggest a remedy. (Local Government Act 1974, sections 26(1) and 26A(1), as amended)
3. Where an individual, organisation or private company is providing services on behalf of a council, we can investigate complaints about the actions of these providers. (Local Government Act 1974, section 25(7), as amended)
4. If we are satisfied with a council’s actions or proposed actions, we can complete our investigation and issue a decision statement. (Local Government Act 1974, section 30(1B) and 34H(i), as amended)

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How I considered this complaint

5. I have spoken to Mr X and considered the Council’s comments and relevant housing records.
6. I have written to Mr X and the Council with my draft decision and considered their comments.

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What I found

The relevant law

7. If someone applies for housing assistance, and the Council has reason to believe he or she may be homeless or threatened with homelessness, it has a duty to make enquiries. The purpose of the enquiries is to establish what (if any) housing duty it may owe the applicant.
8. As part of these enquiries, the Council must decide if the applicant is eligible for assistance. In broad terms, eligibility depends on the applicant’s immigration status. For nationals of European Economic Area (EEA) countries, the law is particularly complex and is set out in the Allocation of Housing and Homelessness (Eligibility) (England) Regulations 2006. An EEA national who is not working, and has not previously worked in the UK, is not eligible for homelessness assistance.
9. If the Council decides an applicant is not eligible, it must give written notice of this decision, but it has no further duty to carry out a full housing assessment and prepare a Personalised Housing Plan. The letter must explain the reasons for an adverse decision and include information about the right to request a review and the timescale for doing so.

What happened

10. The Council has commissioned a charity to provide a homelessness prevention service to young people aged 16 to 25 who live in Manchester.
11. The Council referred Mr X to the charity because he was 20 years old when he approached them for housing assistance.
12. A member of staff at the charity interviewed Mr X in late August 2018. He told her he had been living in his parents’ home in Manchester. They had asked him to leave because he did not have a job. He said he could not return to his parents’ home and had nowhere to stay that night.
13. The member of staff completed an initial contact form. Mr X showed her his passport and she noted he was an EEA national who had come to live in the U.K in 2015. He had not worked in the U.K. She advised him to:
• Provide his parents’ contact number to confirm he was homeless;
• Find a job before any housing referrals could be made;
• Try to find emergency accommodation.
14. The member of staff did not give Mr X a letter confirming the decision that he was not eligible for assistance as an EEA national who was unemployed.
15. Mr X says the member of staff told him he “would not get anything because you are European”. Mr X considers this remark is racist.
16. In early December 2018 Mr X complained to the Council about the service he had received. In January 2019 he met the Council officer who was investigating his complaint. She then wrote to explain that the charity worker had decided he was not eligible for assistance because he is an EEA national who was not working and had not worked before in the UK. She referred to the relevant regulations. She noted that Mr X should have been given a letter explaining the reasons for this decision and his right to request a review. The charity closed his case in August 2018 as “advice only”. She asked him to return if he was awarded benefits. She did not uphold his complaint.
17. Mr X took his complaint to the next stage in the Council’s complaints procedure. In early February the Corporate Complaints team said it was satisfied with the Stage One reply and had nothing further to add.
18. Mr X contacted the Ombudsman in July 2019. Following our enquiries, the Council accepted that the charity should have issued a decision letter with information about review rights. It offered to invite Mr X to return to the Customer Service Centre so it could assess his current circumstances and issue a written decision.
19. When I spoke to Mr X in late September, he said he did not receive any benefits and has no income. He said he has been sleeping in abandoned buildings in the Manchester area. He moves around and has no regular place to stay. He said he has no money to pay fares to attend an interview at the Council’s offices. He told me he would like a new housing assessment. He asked if the Council could contact him and provide a named officer and contact number. He said he would then call the person to arrange an appointment.
20. The Council contacted Mr X in September and October 2019 to make arrangements for him to attend a new assessment interview. Mr X could not attend in September but he was offered an appointment in late November.
21. The Council has provided a flow chart setting out the process the charity now follows when it has initial contact with a homeless young person. The flowchart makes it clear that if staff decide the young person is not eligible for assistance, they must notify this decision in writing.

Analysis

22. The charity had to decide whether Mr X was eligible for housing assistance because this is a legal requirement. This has to be considered for every applicant who seeks assistance. Staff therefore had to ask Mr X about his nationality and status and check his documents to decide whether the Council owed him a duty. It was not racist for staff to make these enquiries or to tell Mr X he was not entitled to assistance based on the evidence he provided about his status.
23. Mr X was an EEA national who was not working when he approached the charity in August 2018. The charity decided he was not eligible for assistance and the Council owed him no further duty. But the charity did not notify Mr X in writing of this decision and his right to request a review if he disagreed with it. This failure to comply with a legal duty was fault. Mr X could not consider whether to exercise his right to request a review without a decision letter.
24. The Council is responsible for this fault because the charity provides a service to young homeless people on its behalf.
25. Mr X’s personal circumstances may have changed since he was interviewed in August 2018. So it is appropriate for the Council to offer him a new interview and then issue a new written decision.
26. The flowchart and instructions issued to staff should ensure they comply with the legal duty to issue written decisions to other young homeless applicants in future.

Agreed action

27. If Mr X has not yet attended an interview, the Council will make one further attempt to contact him by email to offer an appointment. It will then assess his current circumstances and eligibility and send a decision letter with information about his review rights. It should send a copy of the decision letter to the Ombudsman.
28. If Mr X does not respond to the invitation, or fails to attend the appointment, the Council does not need to take any further action.
29. The Council will send a letter of apology to Mr X to acknowledge its failure to give him a written decision in August 2018.
30. It will complete all these actions within one month of this final decision.

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Final decision

31. I have completed the investigation and found the Council was at fault. Mr X lost the opportunity to request a review of the decision that he was not eligible for assistance. However, there is some doubt about whether the eligibility decision would have been changed if there had been a review so the injustice is limited to the loss of opportunity. The Council has agreed to provide a suitable remedy.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman