Summary: We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint about the Council’s general handling of his homelessness application because there is insufficient evidence of fault causing sufficient injustice to justify our involvement. The Council has accepted some fault in relation to the interim accommodation provided but has taken appropriate action to address the issues and further investigation would not lead to a different outcome.

The complaint

1. Mr X complained about the Council’s lack of support when he became homeless after he separated from his partner. In particular, he complained:
1. the Council inappropriately contacted his former partner when he initially approached it;
2. the Council provided unsuitable interim accommodation initially;
3. the accommodation provider for the second interim accommodation carried out intrusive wellbeing checks and a staff member touched his infant child, which was inappropriate;
4. a maintenance person from the second interim accommodation inappropriately entered his room
5. the Council moved him three times before permanent accommodation was provided and only assisted him with the move on one occasion;
6. the Council provided incorrect information to his landlord about his moving date;
7. the Council did not properly assess his needs as a care leaver when deciding the appropriate priority band on its housing register;
8. Council errors meant he did not initially get housing benefit, which led to a threat of the interim accommodation ending;
9. the Council did not handled his complaint properly; and
10. about a lack of data privacy.
2. Mr X said the Council’s failings had caused significant stress that affected his sleep, and he is still recovering from the ordeal.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

3. 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
• any injustice is not significant enough to justify our involvement, or
• further investigation would not lead to a different outcome, or
• there is another body better placed to consider this complaint.

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

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How I considered this complaint

4. I considered the information provided by Mr X and the Council.
5. I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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My assessment

Initial interim accommodation

6. Mr X approached the Council in May 2024. It arranged interim accommodation for him the same day, a Friday. The next day, Mr X reported the accommodation was unsuitable because it was filthy, and the cot was broken and unusable. The Council contacted him on the Monday, at which point Mr X said he was staying elsewhere. It arranged alternative interim accommodation, which Mr X moved into on the Thursday.
7. In its complaint response, the Council accepted the state of the initial interim accommodation was not acceptable and said it had raised concerns with the provider. In addition, it apologised and waived the service charges for the accommodation. Council records indicate Mr X was not left without accommodation as he had made alternative arrangements, and the Council acted without delay to arrange alternative interim accommodation. In the circumstances, I am satisfied the Council the Council took appropriate action to remedy the injustice caused to Mr X and prevent recurrence of that fault. We will not investigate further because this is unlikely to lead to a different outcome.

Second interim accommodation

8. Mr X complained wellbeing checks were intrusive, that a staff member touched his infant child, which was inappropriate, and that a maintenance person inappropriately entered his room. He also complained the Council had asked the accommodation provider to investigate and respond, rather than providing a formal Council response.
9. The Council did respond to the concerns raised at both stages of its complaints process and apologised for initially asking the accommodation provider to respond directly, which it said it did so Mr X would get a faster response. The provider said it carried out its normal wellbeing checks but agreed it could have handled the incident where the staff member touched the child’s chin in a better way and apologised. It said it had given the staff member additional guidance and training. Council records show the maintenance person gave a different account of what happened when they entered Mr X’s room. It is unlikely further investigation by us would be able to resolve the conflict of evidence as it is essentially one person’s word against another’s. However, the Council acknowledged Mr X was very upset and arranged alternative accommodation, which Mr X moved to the following day.
10. We will not investigate the complaints about this accommodation further because it is unlikely this would lead to a different outcome.

Homelessness application

11. Mr X raised various concerns about the Councils’ handling of his homelessness application, and I have reviewed its case notes before making this decision.
12. As already mentioned, the Council arranged interim accommodation on the day Mr X first contacted it. Following a homelessness assessment, it accepted a relief duty and issued a personalised housing plan (PHP). It later agreed to back-date the start of the relief duty to the day Mr X first contacted it, although it was not fault for it to accept the relief duty when it originally did so. There is insufficient evidence of fault in relation to the initial response to justify us investigating further.
13. It is not fault for a council to contact former partners or family members about the reasons for a person’s homelessness, unless the person is homeless as a result of domestic abuse, which was not alleged here. There is therefore insufficient evidence of fault to justify investigating further.
14. The Council accepted an officer had initially said it would send its occupancy agreement and housing benefit (HB) forms to Mr X by email but had not done so the day this was agreed and was then off sick. Subsequently, other officers asked Mr X to attend Council offices to review and sign them. It apologised for this and said it had reminded relevant staff of the importance of reviewing the file before taking action. This caused a delay in HB being agreed and meant an email was sent to Mr X saying the accommodation would be ended if he did not sign the forms by a certain date. However, the accommodation was not ended and HB was secured for the whole period accommodation was provided for. Therefore, an apology was appropriate and there is insufficient injustice to justify investigating this part of the complaint further.
15. In his complaint to us, Mr X also said the Council had only assisted him with one of three moves and that it had given incorrect information to his landlord about his moving-out date. Mr X did not raise these issues when he complained to the Council, so it has not had a chance to respond to them. Councils are not generally required to provide assistance with moving and there is no record in the case notes that any specific assistance was requested. There is insufficient evidence of fault by the Council leading to sufficient injustice to warrant further investigation.
16. Mr X has since accepted a social housing tenancy.

Housing register application

17. The Council accepted a housing register application on the grounds Mr X was homeless. It placed him in the gold band, which is in line with its published allocations scheme, which gives “high priority” when the Council accepts a relief duty. The scheme says gold band priority is also awarded to relevant care leavers. When it accepted a main duty, it moved the application to its emergency band, which was again in line with the published scheme.
18. We will not consider this part of the complaint further because there is insufficient evidence of fault to justify this.

Complaints handling

19. Due to limited resources, we do not investigate complaints about a council’s complaints handling unless we are also investigating the underlying matter complained about. In any case, although there was some delay in the process, partly caused by some confusion about what Mr X needed to do to progress to stage 2 and also because Mr X had made a subject access request, which meant he did not have all the information he considered he needed to pursue the complaint at stage 2 after receiving the stage 1 response. Overall, the Council took appropriate steps to understand and respond to Mr X’s complaint and did so without undue delay. Further investigation is unlikely to lead to a different outcome.

Data privacy

20. We normally expect someone to refer the matter to the Information Commissioner (ICO) if they have a complaint about data protection as the ICO is better placed to consider such complaints.

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Final decision

21. We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint about the Council’s handling of his homelessness application because there is insufficient evidence of fault causing a significant injustice to justify our involvement. We will not investigate his complaints about the interim accommodation provided because the Council has already taken appropriate action to address his concerns and further investigation would not lead to a different outcome.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman