Summary: The Ombudsman will not investigate Ms X’s complaint that the Council misled her about the value of her land. It was Ms X’s choice to lease the land to the Council for the amount it offered and the agreement has now ended. It is not for us to say the Council must pay Ms X more rent now. Ms X may also have recourse for the issue through the courts.

The complaint

1. The complainant, Ms X, complains the Council misled her over the value of her land when agreeing to lease the land to it. She wants the Council to pay her market value for the 10 years it leased the land from her, along with interest and compensation. She also complains the Council breached its undertaking to re-home her to a four-bedroom property as part of negotiations to renew the lease.

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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 must also consider whether any fault has had an adverse impact on the person making the complaint. I refer to this as ‘injustice’. We provide a free service, but must use public money carefully. We may decide not to start or continue with an investigation if we believe:

• it is unlikely we would find fault, or
• the fault has not caused injustice to the person who complained, or
• the injustice is not significant enough to justify our involvement, or
• it is unlikely we could add to any previous investigation by the Council, or
• it is unlikely further investigation will lead to a different outcome, or
• we cannot achieve the outcome someone wants, or
• there is another body better placed to consider this complaint.

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

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)
4. 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 a council has done. (Local Government Act 1974, sections 26B and 34D, as amended)

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How I considered this complaint

5. I reviewed Ms X’s complaint, shared my draft decision with her and considered her comments.

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What I found

6. Ms X agreed a 10-year lease with the Council for land she owned in 2008 at £1,000 per year. She says she has recently found out the Council sub-let the land to a third party for significantly more than this and believes the Council misled her as to its true value. She says the Council signed a new lease with the third party shortly before the lease ended despite knowing she would not renew it.
7. Ms X has now leased the land to the third party directly for £40,000 per year and wants the Council to pay her the difference between the rent agreed and the true market value for the 10 years it leased the land from her.
8. The Ombudsman will not investigate this complaint. In agreeing to lease her land to the Council it was for Ms X to decide how much to charge. While the Council offered only £1,000 per year Ms X did not have to agree to this. She says she had valuations carried out before entering into the agreement which suggested the land was worth more and she could have negotiated with the Council to see if it would pay more. If not, she may have declined the Council’s offer and advertised for other offers. We cannot reopen lease negotiations concluded more than 10 years ago or say the Council must pay more than Ms X accepted at the time. Ms X says she was pressured into signing the agreement but it is unlikely we could say this was the case now and any complaint about this point is late. Had Ms X wanted to take back her land and argue the agreement was valid she should have put this point to the courts.
9. It is unclear if Ms X knew the Council intended to sublet the land but whether it had authority to do this is a point that should have been addressed in the lease. If Ms X considers the Council breached the terms of the lease and/or if she feels the rent agreed was unfair she may wish to take advice about the possibility of making a claim through the courts.
10. While Ms X also complains the Council agreed a new lease with the third party at the end of the lease period, and without seeking her consent, this issue does not affect her personally and if she considers it was a breach of the lease agreement it would have been reasonable for her to take the matter to court.

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Final decision

11. The Ombudsman will not investigate this complaint. This is because it was Ms X’s choice to accept the Council’s offer to lease the land and it is not for us to say it should pay her more now.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman