Summary: The Council was at fault for failing to review whether Miss X’s temporary accommodation remained suitable considering the disrepair she reported. The Council was also at fault for its poor communication and delays in complaint handling. There was no fault in how the Council decided Miss X’s priority on the housing register. To remedy the injustice to Miss X, the Council has agreed to apologise, decide if the property is suitable, and make a payment to Miss X.

The complaint

1. Miss X complained about the Council's handling of her need to move to alternative temporary accommodation because the landlord wants the property back. Miss X says the Council:
1. communicates poorly;
2. has not moved her, despite her notice to quit expiring in December 2023;
3. failed to address disrepair, including a lack of hot water in her temporary accommodation;
4. failed to backdate her housing register application to 2018, despite promising to do so in response to her complaint;
5. failed to take into account her mental health needs in its assessment of her priority for rehousing; and
6. delayed responding to her complaint.
2. Miss X says, as a result, she is living with ongoing anxiety and uncertainty about when or if she will have to move and has experienced avoidable frustration and distress.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

3. 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 significant injustice, or that could cause injustice to others in the future we may suggest a remedy. (Local Government Act 1974, sections 26(1) and 26A(1), as amended)
4. 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)
5. If we are satisfied with an organisation’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

6. I considered the complaint and the information Miss X provided.
7. I made written enquiries of the Council and considered its response along with relevant law and guidance.
8. I referred to the Ombudsman's Guidance on Remedies, a copy of which can be found on our website.
9. Ms X and the organisation had an opportunity to comment on my draft decision. I considered any comments received before making a final decision.

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What I found

Temporary accommodation

10. Temporary accommodation is accommodation provided to homeless applicants as part of a council’s main housing duty.
11. The law says councils must ensure all accommodation provided to homeless applicants is suitable for the needs of the applicant and members of their household. (Housing Act 1996, section 206 and Homelessness Code of Guidance 17.2)
12. Councils must assess whether accommodation is suitable for each household individually. Whether accommodation is suitable will depend on the relevant needs, requirements and circumstances of the homeless person and their household. (Homelessness Code of Guidance 17.4 & 17.9)

What happened

13. The Council owes Miss X the main housing duty. She lives in temporary accommodation with her children. A private landlord owns the temporary accommodation. Miss X is on the housing register with a priority date in 2020.
14. In October 2023, the landlord served notice on the Council to end its lease of the building. As a result, the Council visited Miss X to give her a notice to quit which said she had to leave by early December.
15. In November, Miss X asked the Council how long it would be until she moved. She said the uncertainty was stressful. In response, the Council told Miss X it had a shortage of available accommodation and that it would offer her alternative accommodation as soon as it could.
16. Miss X completed medical forms to request increased priority on the housing register. She said she had mental health issues and one of her children had asthma. She said she needed a ground floor property.
17. In late November, the Council wrote to Miss X to say there was no medical reason she could not use stairs. It did not, therefore, award any medical priority. The mayor wrote to the Council on Miss X’s behalf to request an update on her case.
18. In late December, Miss X emailed the Council. She said the notice to quit had expired and she wanted an update. She said worrying about what was happening was affecting her mental health.
19. In January 2024, not having received a response, Miss X complained to the Council. She said:
• Her housing officer never responded to emails or calls
• The notice to quit had expired but she had not moved
• She lived on the top floor with no lift. Two of her children could not yet climb stairs and so she had to carry them one at a time, leaving the other alone. She said this was dangerous
• The landlord had refused to carry out any maintenance or pest control because of the notice
20. Miss X’s housing officer replied to her December email in late January. The officer apologised for the delay and repeated what appears to be a standard form of words about shortage of accommodation.
21. In early February, the Council replied to the mayor’s enquiry. It said its lack of communication with Miss X was because of “the arduous daily tasks set out and an overwhelming volume of case load” of the housing officers. The Council told the mayor it had requested that Miss X’s housing register application be backdated to 2018, when she first approached as homeless because she was fleeing domestic abuse.
22. The Council responded to Miss X’s complaint at stage one of its complaint process in March. It said:
• It was sorry for the poor communication. It had raised this with senior managers in the service.
• The housing officer would contact Miss X when it had new accommodation to offer her
• It would consider the floor level of any future accommodation offers with no lift given the age of her children
• It could not backdate her priority to 2018, because at that time she did not meet the residence criteria for its scheme. Although its current scheme included an exception for people fleeing domestic abuse, this did not apply to existing applications. So Miss X’s 2020 registration date was correct.
23. Miss X asked the Council to consider her complaint at stage two of the complaint process. She said:
• She had no confidence the Council’s communication would improve
• She did not understand why the exception in the housing register policy did not apply to her
• The main cause of her complaint was feeling neglected and not heard. She said being ignored felt terrible.
24. The Council responded to Miss X’s complaint at stage two of its process in late July. It said:
• It was sorry for the delay responding to the complaint.
• Her housing officer would contact her when the Council had accommodation to offer. The shortage of accommodation meant it couldn’t move her as quickly as it would like.

My findings

25. I set out my findings on the complaint in the order they appear in paragraph one.

Communication

26. The Council has already accepted fault for its poor communication with Miss X. An apology is a suitable remedy for the avoidable frustration and distress this caused.

Move

27. In response to my enquiries, the Council said it uses a “relative need database” to keep track of and prioritise households in temporary accommodation who need to move. Households are given a priority code which indicates the reason for the move and its urgency. Miss X’s code is “LL” which means the landlord has requested the property back, but the property is otherwise suitable. As of 10 December 2024, there were 423 other households with the same priority code.
28. However, there is no evidence the Council considered if Miss X’s reports of disrepair, overcrowding, and living at height with young children mean the property is unsuitable. This was fault.
29. If the property is unsuitable, the Council would have an immediate duty to provide suitable accommodation. Its failure to consider this and make a decision leaves Miss X with avoidable uncertainty. This is an injustice to Miss X.

Disrepair

30. Miss X told the Council in January 2024 that the landlord was refusing to deal with maintenance or pest control issues. From March 2024, Miss X had no hot water in her bathroom. There is no evidence the Council acted to address these issues with the landlord before December 2024. This was fault.
31. The evidence shows that Miss X and her children’s social worker unsuccessfully tried to report issues to the landlord. However, once the Council contacted the landlord in December 2024, the landlord took steps to address the hot water issue. It is likely, therefore, that this would have happened sooner if the Council had intervened earlier. Instead, Miss X lived with avoidable disrepair for longer than she should have. This is an injustice to Miss X.

Housing register priority date

32. Miss X first approached the Council as homeless in 2018 because she fled domestic abuse. At that time, the Council’s allocations policy required applicants to have lived in the borough for three years before they qualified for the scheme. Miss X met this criterion in 2020, at which point the Council awarded her priority.
33. Later in 2020, the Council changed its allocations policy. The change introduced an exception to the three-year residence rule for people fleeing domestic abuse. In her complaint, Miss X said this exception should apply to her and so her priority date should be in 2018, not 2020.
34. The new policy applied to new applications. It did not, therefore, apply to Miss X. There is no fault in how the Council introduced the new policy or applied it to Miss X’s circumstances.
35. However, in its communication with Miss X and the mayor, the Council avoidably raised Miss X’s expectations by saying it had “requested” her application be backdated. This led Miss X to think the Council had already decided to apply the backdate and the request was to action the decision. The Council should have been clear to Miss X that it was asking the service to consider whether Miss X’s priority date was correct. Failure to make this clear was fault.

Medical priority

36. Miss X says the Council only considered her physical health before deciding she had no medical priority and did not take into account her mental health conditions. The Council’s decision refers to Miss X’s ability to use stairs. However, this addressed Miss X’s report that she needed to live on the ground floor because of claustrophobia and fear of heights.
37. The Council assessed the information Miss X provided and arrived at a decision open to it. There is no fault in how it made the decision.

Complaint handling

38. The Council’s complaint policy says it will respond to complaints at both stages of its process within 20 working days. It took the Council 48 working days to respond to Miss X’s stage one complaint. It took the Council 87 working days to respond to Miss X’s stage two complaint.
39. These delays of 28 and 67 days were fault. It caused Miss X avoidable distress and frustration, which is an injustice.

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Agreed action

40. To remedy the injustice to Miss X from the faults I have identified, the Council has agreed to:
• Apologise to Miss X in line with our guidance on Making an effective apology
• Decide if Miss X’s current temporary accommodation in suitable and communicate the decision to Miss X in writing, setting out her statutory right of review and appeal
• Confirm with Miss X the details of any outstanding disrepair issues and ensure the landlord addresses these.
• Pay Miss X £250 in recognition of her avoidable frustration, distress, and uncertainty.
41. The Council should take this action within four weeks of my final decision.
42. We have already made service improvement recommendations to the Council about making and recording decisions on suitability and responding to complaints in line with its policy. I have not repeated those here.

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Final decision

43. I have completed my investigation. There was some fault by the Council. The action I have recommended is a suitable remedy for the injustice caused.

Investigator’s decision on behalf of the Ombudsman

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman