Summary: We will not investigate this complaint about the Council’s assessment of a homelessness and a housing application. There is insufficient evidence of fault which would warrant an investigation.

The complaint

1. Miss X complained about the Council’s failure to rehouse her when she made a homelessness application. She says she was offered interim accommodation which she could not accept because it would not accommodate her dog. She also says her housing application was not given sufficient priority to reflect her homeless situation.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

2. We investigate complaints of injustice caused by ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’. I have used the word fault to refer to these. 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)

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How I considered this complaint

3. I considered information provided by the complainant and the Council’s responses. I have also considered the Council’s housing allocations policy.
4. I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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My assessment

5. Miss X says the Council failed to rehouse her when she was served with a notice to quit by her landlord in 2023. At the time she was a single housing applicant and was not in a priority need group. In 2025 she made a new homelessness application because she was pregnant. The Council accepted her under the homelessness Relief duty and gave her a Personalised Housing Plan and offered her interim accommodation.
6. Miss X says she could not accept the accommodation because it was not self-contained and could not allow her to have her dog with her. The Council told her that her dog is not an assistance dog and that interim accommodation is often not self-contained and may not be in the Council’s area but it is short-term emergency accommodation. It could not accommodate her dog and could only offer advice about re-homing it temporarily.
7. Miss X did not accept the accommodation offered and the Council could have ended its duty but it did not do so. She complained that she was only given Band C priority on her housing application even though she was in a homeless situation. The Council’s allocations policy awards band C to applicants who are homeless but who have not been accepted for the Main housing duty. When they are accepted for that duty the banding is increased to Band B.
8. The Council says that since Miss X complained to us in June she has been rehoused from the allocations list.
9. The Ombudsman is not an appeal body. This means we do not take a second look at a decision to decide if it was wrong. Instead, we look at the processes an organisation followed to make its decision. If we consider it followed those processes correctly, we cannot question whether the decision was right or wrong, regardless of whether someone disagrees with the decision the organisation made.
10. There is no evidence to suggest that the council failed to follow the correct procedures when it considered Miss X’s homelessness application and when it prioritised her housing application. The Ombudsman may not find fault with a council’s assessment of a housing application or a housing applicant’s priority if it has carried this out in line with its published allocations scheme. We recognise that the demand for social housing far outstrips the supply of properties in many areas.

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Final decision

11. We will not investigate this complaint about the Council’s assessment of a homelessness and a housing application. There is insufficient evidence of fault which would warrant an investigation.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman