Summary: We will not investigate this complaint that the Council unreasonable decided that the complainant was intentionally homeless. This is because the Council will complete the review of its decision in the coming days and the complainant can then challenge the Council’s decision in court.

The complaint

1. The complainant, who I will call Mr X complains about the Council’s decision to end its homelessness duty as it considered him to be intentionally homeless. He says he reviewed the decision but did not receive a response.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

2. The Local Government Act 1974 sets out our powers but also imposes restrictions on what we can investigate.
3. The Ombudsman investigates 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 or may decide not to continue with an investigation if we decide there is not enough evidence of fault to justify investigating. (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6))
4. 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

5. I considered information provided by the complainant and the Council.
6. I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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My assessment

7. The Council ended its homelessness duty to Mr X in August, and Mr X subsequently asked the Council to review its decision. The Council had no address for Mr X so called him. Case notes show Mr X talked over the officer swore and became abusive so the call was terminated, and the review could not be completed.
8. The Ombudsman contacted the Council about the review and provided it with Mr X’s complaint which included a new address for him. The Council said it would carry out its review and write to Mr X with the outcome in the coming days.
9. I will not investigate Mr X’s complaint. The Council will write to him with the outcome of its review. If dissatisfied with the outcome he will have the right to appeal the county court on a point of law.
10. There was a relatively short delay in the Council completing its review. However, it is unlikely we would find the Council to be at fault for this delay. This is due to the challenges it faced gaining information from Mr X during the call it made to him.

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Final decision

11. We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint because the Council will complete its review in the coming days, and he will then have the opportunity to challenge the review in court.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman