Summary: We will not investigate this complaint about the Council ending its homelessness duty. It is more appropriate for the statutory review procedure to decide this point.

The complaint

1. Miss X complains the Council wrongly ended its homelessness duty to her and her family.

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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 it would be reasonable for the person to ask for a council review or appeal. (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended, section 34(B))
3. 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

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

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My assessment

6. The Council ended its homelessness duty because, it said, Miss X had refused a suitable property. Miss X argues she did not refuse the property, so the Council should not have ended its duty.
7. When a Council makes a decision such as this, the applicant has the right to ask the Council to review its decision. If the Council’s overturns the decision, the Council will reinstate the homelessness duty. If the Council’s review upholds the ending of the duty, the applicant can appeal to the county court on a point of law. (Housing Act 1996, sections 202 and 204)
8. Miss X’s solicitor asked the Council for a review. The review was underway when Miss X complained to us on 2 September 2024. I shall not consider events after the complaint to us.
9. The law expressly provides this route for challenging such decisions, so we normally expect people to use it. Miss X knew about her review right, she had legal representation, and she used her right to ask for a review. It is more appropriate for the review procedure to deal with this matter than for the Ombudsman to become involved.
10. If the review decision is favourable to Miss X, the Council will reinstate its duty and the matter will be resolved.
11. If the Council delays over eight weeks completing the review without Miss X agreeing more time, Miss X will have the right to ask the county court to decide the matter. If the review decision upholds the original reason for ending the duty, Miss X will have the right to appeal to the county court on a point of law. The question of whether an applicant’s action amounted to refusing an offer is a point of law. So, in either of those cases, the restriction in paragraph 3 would apply. In those scenarios, it would be reasonable to expect Miss X to take court action. This is because the court could provide the remedy Miss X wants (reversing the Council’s decision) and Miss X has access to legal advice. The potential cost of court action is not in itself automatically a reason to consider court action unreasonable. Miss X could get help with court costs if she is eligible and she could ask the court for her costs if her action succeeds.
12. Miss X argued the Council’s actions in ending the homelessness duty the way it did amounts to discrimination on the basis of a family member’s disability. This point is not sufficiently separable from the question of whether the Council was wrong to end its homelessness duty to enable me to consider how the Council took account of any Equality Act duties.

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Final decision

13. We will not investigate Miss X’s complaint. It is more appropriate for the statutory review procedure to decide whether the Council was wrong to end its duty.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman