Summary: The Ombudsman will not investigate this complaint about the sale of a parcel of land for a residential development. This mainly because the complaint has been made late and, in any case, there is no sign of fault by the Council regarding the matter in question.

The complaint

1. The complainant, who I shall call Mr X, complained that the Council should have intervened to prevent the sale of a piece of land near his home for a residential development. In particular Mr X felt the Council should have imposed more restrictions on future sales when it transferred ownership of its social housing stock, including the land in question, to a housing trust around 2000. He also felt the Council should have objected to the successor housing association’s sale of the land to a private developer around 2017.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

2. We investigate complaints about ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’. In this statement, I have used the word fault to refer to these. We provide a free service, but must use public money carefully. We may decide not to start an investigation if, for example, we believe it is unlikely we would find fault. (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended)
3. The law says we cannot investigate late complaints unless we decide there are good reasons. Late complaints are when someone takes more than 12 months to complain to us about something an authority has done. (Local Government Act 1974, sections 26B and 34D)
4. We investigate complaints about councils and certain other bodies. We cannot investigate the actions of housing trusts or housing associations. (Local Government Act 1974, sections 25 and 34A, as amended)

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How I considered this complaint

5. I considered the information Mr X provided with his complaint, and his comments in response to a draft version of this decision.

What I found

6. Around 2000 the Council transferred ownership of its social housing stock to a housing trust. The sale included green spaces and land associated with the housing. The trust subsequently merged with a housing association (‘the association’).
7. In 2017 Mr X discovered that the association intended to sell a patch of land near his home to a private individual. Mr X was unhappy about this as he said the land was a local amenity and a security feature which he and other residents had enjoyed the benefit of for many years.
8. Later in 2017 Mr X contacted the association and the Council to query the sale. However the association confirmed it was legally entitled to sell the land, and the Council said it had no power to intervene regarding the disposal.
9. The sale of the land went ahead, and in 2018 the new owner applied for planning permission to build a new house on the site. The Council subsequently approved the application.

Analysis

10. However, I have reached the view that the Ombudsman should not investigate Mr X’s complaint about the sale of the land.
11. In particular I note Mr X became aware of the central issue in his complaint during 2017. However he only complained to us regarding this matter late in 2019.
12. In the circumstances I consider Mr X has made his complaint to us well over 12 months after becoming aware of the issue in question. As a result I have concluded that the restriction on our jurisdiction to investigate late complaints, which I refer to in paragraph 3, applies in his case.
13. In addition I see no reason why Mr X could not have complained to us sooner about this matter. Therefore I am not convinced we have grounds to exercise our discretion not to apply the time restriction in his case.
14. But even if the time restriction did not apply, I am still not convinced we would have grounds to pursue Mr X’s complaint.
15. In particular, part of Mr X’s complaint relates to what happened when the Council agreed to transfer its housing stock to the housing trust around 2000. But we have already considered a complaint from Mr X about this matter. In that case we decided not to pursue the complaint because it was very unlikely we could carry out a meaningful investigation now about events which happened so long ago. I see no reason to differ from this view in relation to Mr X’s current complaint about what happened around 2000.
16. Further, I consider that Mr X’s main complaints about the sale of the land are against the association. But as I indicate in paragraph 4, we have no jurisdiction to investigate complaints against housing associations.
17. In addition I do not see we would be likely to find fault with the Council in respect of the sale of the land. Mr X felt the transfer agreement from 2000 gave the Council power to overrule the association where this was in the interests of the people of the Borough. But I am not convinced the Council had power to block the transaction, or that we could fault it for not necessarily opposing the sale.
18. In particular I see from an email the Council sent to the association in 2016 that it had no objection to the disposal of the land, noting that this was an opportunity to re-invest the proceeds into much needed affordable housing. I consider the Council was reasonably entitled to give weight to this factor in reaching a view about the sale.

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Final Decision

19. The Ombudsman will not investigate Mr X’s complaint about the sale of a piece of land near his home. This is mainly because he has made his complaint late and, in any case, there is no sign of fault by the Council in respect of this matter.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman