Summary: We will not investigate this complaint about the Council’s provision of interim accommodation in 2023 under its homelessness duty. The Council has offered a suitable remedy for exceeding the period for which only bed and breakfast accommodation was provided.

The complaint

1. Mr X complained about the Council placing him in several different travel hotels over an 8 -week period in 2023. He also says the accommodation was sometimes outside the borough and too far away to be suitable for his family’s needs.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

2. We investigate 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 continue an investigation if we decide:

• there is not enough evidence of fault to justify investigating, or
• we could not add to any previous investigation by the organisation, or
• further investigation would not lead to a different outcome.
•  

(Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended, section 34(B))

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How I considered this complaint

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

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My assessment

5. Mr X says the Council placed him in over 5 different hotel locations when it accepted his homeless application in May 2023. He says some of these were some distance from the borough and this was inconvenient for his family, particularly because the accommodation was not self-contained.
6. He says he was also placed in a room in a shared building and there was no electricity supply at the meter when he moved in. the Council said the utility company were required to connect the supply on a new tenancy and this was beyond the landlord’s control.
7. The Council says it accepts that the multiple offers of emergency interim accommodation were difficult for his family but there was an acute shortage of temporary housing in its area at the time and it, like many London authorities was forced to source accommodation further afield.
8. The Council also accepted that it exceeded the government recommendation that non-self-contained bed and breakfast accommodation should only be used for 6 weeks. Mr X was offered self-contained accommodation in July which exceeded the 6-week period by approximately two weeks.
9. The Council has offered Mr X £350 as a goodwill gesture for the inconvenience he suffered in being in hotel accommodation for longer than he should have been. This is a reasonable remedy for the injustice which Mr X experienced and we would not achieve a different remedy by investigating the complaint further.

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Final decision

10. We will not investigate this complaint about the Council’s provision of interim accommodation in 2023 under its homelessness duty. The Council has offered a suitable remedy for exceeding the period for which only bed and breakfast accommodation was provided.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman