London Borough of Newham
Complaint overview
Between 1 April 2024 to 31 March 2025, we dealt with 206 complaints. Of these, 96 were not for us or not ready for us to investigate. We assessed and closed 70 complaints. We investigated 40 complaints.
More about this data
Complaints dealt with – the total number of complaints and enquiries considered. It is not appropriate to investigate all of them.
Not for us – includes complaints brought to us before the council was given chance to consider it, or the complainant came to the wrong Ombudsman.
Assessed and closed – includes complaints where the law says we’re not allowed to investigate, or it would be a poor use of public funds if we did.
Investigated – we completed an investigation and made a decision on whether we found fault, or no fault.
Complaints upheld – we completed an investigation and found evidence of fault, or the organisation provided a suitable remedy early on.
Satisfactory remedies provided by the Council – the council upheld the complaint and we agreed with how it offered to put things right.
Compliance with Ombudsman recommendations – not complying with our recommendations is rare. A council with a compliance rate below 100% should scrutinise the complaints where it failed to comply and identify any learning.
Average performance rates – we compare the annual statistics of similar types of councils to work out an average level of performance. We do this for County Councils, District Councils, Metropolitan Boroughs, Unitary Councils, and London Boroughs.
For more information on understanding our statistics see Interpreting our complaints data.
Complaints dealt with
Not for us
Assessed and closed
Investigated
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Complaints upheld
We investigated 40 complaints and upheld 35.
88% of complaints we investigated were upheld.
This compares to an average of 84% in similar authorities.
View upheld decisionsAdjusted for London Borough of Newham's population, this is 9.7% upheld decisions per 100,000 residents.
The average for authorities of this type is
9.1% upheld decisions per 100,000 residents. -
Satisfactory remedies provided by the Council
In 10 out of 35 upheld cases we found the Council had provided a satisfactory remedy before the complaint reached the Ombudsman.
29% satisfactory remedy rate.
This compares to an average of 12% in similar authorities.
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Compliance with Ombudsman recommendations
We recorded compliance outcomes in 23 cases.
In 23 cases we were satisfied with the actions taken.100% compliance rate with recommendations.
This compares to an average of 100% in similar authorities.
Annual letters
We write to councils each year to give a summary of the complaint statistics we record about them,
and their performance in responding to our investigations.
Reports
The Ombudsman has published the following reports against London Borough of Newham
Find out more about reports
We issue reports on certain investigations, particularly where there is a wider public interest to do so. Common reasons for reports are significant injustice, systemic issues, major learning points and non-compliance with our recommendations. Issuing reports is one way we help to ensure councils are accountable to local people and highlighting the learning from complaints helps to improve services for everybody. Reports are published for 10 years.
No reports published
Service improvements
The Council has agreed to make the following improvements to its services following an Ombudsman investigation.
Find out more about service improvements
When we find fault, we can recommend improvements to systems and processes where they haven’t worked properly, so that others do not suffer from these same problems in future. Common examples are policy changes; procedural reviews; and staff training. Service improvements from decisions are published for 5 years and those from reports are published for 10 years.
The latest 10 cases are listed below – click ‘view all’ to find all service improvements.
Case reference: 24 006 067
Category: Adult care services
Sub Category: Transport
- The Council will:-a) review the Council’s policy on how it considers people who have hidden disabilities but can go out if accompanied to ensure it is in line with DfT guidance and the Council is not fettering its discretion;
- b) review procedures to ensure appeal outcomes are properly reasoned; and
- c) review why there was a delay in dealing with the appeal and produce a plan about how it intends to reduce future delay.
Case reference: 24 005 884
Category: Housing
Sub Category: Homelessness
- The Council has agreed to review the liaison arrangements with managing agents to ensure it is aware of any repair issues that are ongoing, especially where buildings are owned by a third party, to ensure the Council is meeting its repair duties.
Case reference: 24 005 745
Category: Adult care services
Sub Category: Charging
- The Council will review what information about financial assessments and charging it should give to its residents during their six weeks of intermediate care. The Council will ensure that social workers, as part of the process, explain how residents’ finances will be assessed and what the residents can expect to be charged for. They will also provide relevant written information.
Case reference: 24 003 799
Category: Education
Sub Category: Special educational needs
- The Council will remind the front-line special educational needs staff and their managers of the Council’s absolute duty to ensure delivery of special educational provision included in children’s EHC Plans and the need to act without delay when schools cannot secure the full therapy package included in children’s EHC Plans. The Council should provide us with evidence it has completed this action.
Case reference: 24 002 528
Category: Housing
Sub Category: Homelessness
- Share learning from this decision with the homelessness prevention and assistance service.
- Provide internal staff training to the homelessness prevention and assistance service about when the Council’s interim accommodation duty arises. Pay attention to the different thresholds outlined in Chapter 15 of the Homelessness Code of Guidance for Local Authorities.
Case reference: 24 002 314
Category: Children's care services
Sub Category: Looked after children
- the Council will issue guidance to complaint staff to ensure that they understand the discretion under the Children Act complaints procedure to investigate historic complaints out of time and that they must show how they have considered this discretion.
Case reference: 24 001 585
Category: Housing
Sub Category: Homelessness
- Ensure the Council assesses and make its decisions in a timely manner about what duty it owes to applicants who are either threatened to be homeless or are homeless.
- Remind relevant staff of the importance of reviewing the duty it owes applicants when there has been a change to their homeless/housing situations in line with the code of guidance. The Council should also ensure it issues applicants with its decision letters to notify them of the duty accepted or ended and the applicants review rights.
- Train relevant staff on the use of the Council’s new information and communication technology system for creating and monitoring personal housing plans. The Council should also remind relevant staff of the importance of creating a robust, specific and realistic personal housing plans for applicants. It should ensure the plans are reviewed regularly especially when there has been a change in the applicant’s housing situation. This will allow the Council and the applicants focus on steps required to help secure their accommodation.
- Remind relevant staff of the importance of adhering to the Council’s complaints procedure.
Case reference: 24 000 018
Category: Housing
Sub Category: Allocations
- Remind staff that the Housing Act 1996 does not limit the number of homelessness applications that can be made and that applicants can apply to more than one local authority at the same time.
- Remind staff to ensure they consider contacts from applicants about dissatisfaction with a priority band decision as potential review requests, not only as complaints.
- Remind staff to ensure the Council’s decision/notification letters to applicants clearly explain the right to request a review, including timescales, and also provide clear grounds for the decision.
Case reference: 23 020 975
Category: Housing
Sub Category: Homelessness
- The Council agreed to deliver a briefing to all housing caseworkers who assess homeless applicants to reinforce advice in the Government code of guidance on the correct approach to take when the homeless applicant has received a Section 21 Housing Act from their landlord. In this case the Council had failed to follow that advice leading to unnecessary distress and costs for the complainant.
- The Council agreed to also introduce a procedure to review on a regular basis all cases where it has accepted it owes the prevention duty to homeless applicants. This is so it can avoid drift in cases and make timely decisions on ending that duty and / or setting out what further duties it may owe to the applicant.
Case reference: 23 019 061
Category: Adult care services
Sub Category: Other
- The Council will issue written reminders to relevant staff to ensure they are aware they must review a service user’s care and support plan every 12 months.
Last updated: 4 April 2015