Local Government

Summary

After moving into a council property, Mr A told the council that water was coming in at the front door and there was mould growing in the bathroom. The council arranged to paint the bathroom but the mould problems continued, and the front door leak was not repaired. Mr A submitted a formal complaint and also raised concerns about draughts and condensation in the bedrooms. He said that this had forced him to sleep in the lounge area and that the problems with dampness, mould and drafts had had an adverse impact on his health.

Mr A was re-housed within two days of submitting his complaint to the council and, in formally responding to the complaint, they acknowledged that they had not followed their normal process in dealing with the repairs. They apologised for the inconvenience, undertook to speak to staff to avoid similar future problems, and compensated Mr A for damaged possessions and mail items. Mr A was not satisfied with this and requested that his rent payments be refunded. The council did not consider this appropriate as, in their view, Mr A had also contributed to the problem by failing to adequately heat and ventilate the property.

Miss C, an advice worker, complained to us on behalf of Mr A that the council had failed to reasonably address the problems with the property and failed to acknowledged that the problems were there before Mr A's tenancy started. To support this, she provided a letter from a previous tenant who said that he had also told the council about problems of water coming in and mould growth. Our enquiries revealed that required repair work, identified before the departure of the previous tenant, was not carried out before Mr A started his tenancy. We also found that the council should have carried out an inspection between tenancies, but this was not done. We noted that the council had then been slow to respond to repair requests by Mr A and that the required repair to the front door was not carried out at all during his tenancy. We, therefore, upheld the complaint. However, we noted that the council had already acknowledged their failings and taken what we considered to be reasonable steps to address these, and we did not find it necessary to make any recommendations.

Summary

Mr and Mrs C have a teenage son with a disability. They were unhappy with the council’s handling of an assessment of their need for an increased respite service and said there was poor communication. They complained to the council’s social work service. Their complaint was fully upheld and three recommendations were made and implemented, one on a limited basis. Mr and Mrs C were not satisfied and made a request that their complaint be taken to a complaints review committee (CRC). When that request was not met they complained to us about the council’s failure to meet their request and failure to communicate with them.

We upheld both elements of Mr and Mrs C's complaint. Our investigation found that there had been an unacceptable delay in convening the CRC because the council lacked a full panel of appropriately qualified persons. There had also been continuing poor communication by the council in telling Mr and Mrs C about the reasons for this delay.

Recommendations

We recommended that the council:

• convene a CRC at the earliest opportunity; and
• keep Mr and Mrs C informed of progress in convening the CRC.

Summary

Mr C, who is Mr A's representative, complained that there were inaccuracies in the report of a social work complaints review committee meeting, that was presented to the housing and social work services committee. He wanted to correct minor factual accuracies concerning Mr A's title and age. He also disagreed with some of the findings of the report and said he had not received a response to his letter highlighting the inaccuracies.

We found that, in accordance with council procedures, Mr C's comments were appended to the report for consideration by the committee. The council provided a copy of the information presented to the committee and it included Mr C's comments as appendix three to the document. The minutes of the social work services committee meeting also recorded that the report presented to the committee 'included comments from Mr A's representative’ and was approved. We were satisfied that Mr C's comments were heard and taken into consideration by the committee in deciding that the recommendations of the sub-committee be approved and told Mr C we would not be pursuing his complaint any further.

Summary

Mr C runs a business situated on a road that the council intended to close temporarily for a week to allow for resurfacing. The normal practice was that the council prepared a letter for a representative of the contractor to hand-deliver to businesses at least a week before work started and, at the same time, to discuss specific access requirements. Mr C complained that the council did not reasonably undertake their responsibilities under the Construction (Design and Management) Regulations 2007 about access and egress (entry and exit) to the works area; did not follow their own health and safety procedures in relation to the road works; and did not investigate his complaints about these matters within a reasonable time scale.

Our investigation confirmed that the council’s contractor had not notified and discussed specific access and egress requirements with Mr C (and a number of other businesses) until four calendar days before the work started. Mr C also had photographic evidence showing that health and safety procedures were on at least one occasion not followed when a vehicle reversed without a banksman (reversing assistant) in attendance. We, therefore, upheld the first two elements of Mr C’s complaint. We did not uphold the complaint about complaints handling, as although the complaint took slightly longer to deal with than indicated by the council’s published timelines, we found there had been mitigating circumstances.

Recommendations

We recommended that the council:

• copy this decision notice to the contractor and remind them of their responsibilities under the Construction (Design and Management) Regulations 2007 and related health and safety measures.

Summary

Mr C complained about the way in which the council dealt with a request for approval of matters specified in the conditions of a planning permission. In particular, he said that the council had not informed members of the public about changes in planning guidance; had not given proper consideration to the objections he and his neighbours made; and failed to take account of access and turning arrangements in and to the site concerned.

We investigated the complaint and took into account all the information provided by Mr C and by the council (including the complaints file, complaints procedure and relevant policies). We also obtained independent planning advice and made further inquiries of the council.

We did not uphold Mr C's complaints. Our investigation confirmed that changes to the planning guidance concerned had taken place after a period of consultation, and met pre-agreed criteria. Although Mr C considered that further consultation should then have taken place, this was not a requirement of the planning legislation. Also, the documentation confirmed that the council had given due consideration to Mr C and his neighbours' representations but, still, decided to grant approval. They were also satisfied that the developer provided sufficient information to demonstrate that access onto and within the site was satisfactory. Although Mr C provided his own professional advice which demonstrated the contrary, this was not provided until after the application was decided.

Summary

Mr C said that shortly after the council launched the commonwealth graduate fund (CGF) in November 2011 he phoned them to ask about his eligibilty for an award and described his circumstances. He said that he did not receive a response and he then sent two email enquiries in December 2011. When he did not receive a response to a further enquiry to a local councillor, he made a formal complaint to the council. He said he was later told that the criteria for the award had changed and he was not eligible. In the intervening period, the published criteria on the council's website was changed, in particular a residency requirement was introduced which excluded residents outwith the council's boundary.

Mr C felt that council staff had decided that the CGF should not apply to people in his situation. He told us that he believed that they had deliberately ignored his phone call and deleted his emails until the criteria were changed, with a view to making him ineligible. He also believed that the criteria were not changed on 22 November 2011, as advised by the council, as the information on the council’s website was not updated until 12 January 2012. He was also concerned about the fairness of the decision to restrict the scheme to those who live in the city as he believed this was discriminatory to older applicants with families who are more likely to live outwith the city boundary.

Our investigation found that the council had dealt with Mr C in a fair and equitable way. While acknowledging that his initial emails were not received as they were treated as ‘spam’, we noted that the council had apologised to him, had taken steps to ensure that this does not happen again and had explained to him the action they had taken. Our view was that once the council did receive Mr C's application, it was dealt with fairly and promptly, as was all his subsequent correspondence on the matter. The council's decision that Mr C was not eligible for the award was based on the fact that he was currently still studying and therefore did not meet the criterion of ‘graduates who had completed their studies and had not been successful in gaining graduate employment’.

We found no evidence to support Mr C's view that his enquiries were deliberately ignored until the criteria were changed. We also considered his belief that the criteria were not changed at the meeting held on 22 November 2011. We found that the meeting was held to review the qualifying criteria, in particular the need to ‘have a parental home in the city boundary’. The decision was taken to remove this immediately as it was considered to be intrusive, and in some case, impossible for the council to verify the parental relationship or to establish the parental address. We did not uphold his complaints as we found no evidence of maladministration in this or in the council’s handling of his application.

Summary

Mr C complained about the way the council responded to his complaints about the care provided by the council's social work services, and in particular by his son's mental health officer. His complaint had been considered by an independent complaints review committee hearing, as required by the statutory social work complaints procedure.

We reviewed the process the council followed and were satisfied that they had investigated and responded to his complaint in line with the social work complaints procedure. As a result, we did not uphold his complaint.

Summary

Mr and Mrs C live in a ground floor four-in-a-block flat and are the sole council tenants in the block. The flat directly upstairs has a private tenant. Mr and Mrs C complained about unreasonable delay by the council in repairing the roof and rhones, which they felt resulted in dampness in their flat; the council’s failure to deal with problems of antisocial behaviour from the upstairs tenant, and the council’s failure to take action in relation to five incidents of flooding from the upstairs property.

We upheld one of the three complaints, as our investigation found that there was an unreasonable delay of eleven months between the council obtaining a quote for the roof and rhone repairs and the repairs being done. This was initially because they sent a copy of the quote to the occupant rather than the owner of the upstairs flat and did not follow up the lack of a reply. We made recommendations to address these failings. We did not uphold the complaint about antisocial behaviour because Mrs C had not provided the necessary information to take the matter forward and there was no corroboration from others. The council had no record of three of the five incidents of flooding, and had taken action on one some three years earlier. The fifth incident had only occurred on the eve of Mr and Mrs C’s final stage complaint to the council.

Recommendations

We recommended that the council:

• explain to Mr and Mrs C what the installation of a chemical damp proof course and kitchen upgrading would entail and, if that work would be unduly disruptive to Mrs C because of her medical condition, make appropriate arrangements for short term temporary accommodation; and
• investigate any request that Mr and Mrs C make about repairs to the fabric of their flat as a result of the internal flooding incident on a date in March and take the remedial action necessary.

Summary

Mr C raised a number of issues about the council's handling of a planning application and an application for Conservation Area Consent (CAC). Mr C felt that the report on the planning application was misleading and did not express balanced views. He maintained that Historic Scotland had expressed concerns about the development but that these were not included in the planning report or the CAC report. During our investigation the council confirmed that it was their responsibility as planning authority to determine applications and that there was no statutory requirement to consult with Historic Scotland on applications for CAC or planning permission. There was only a statutory duty to notify Historic Scotland of the council's proposed decision on CAC. However, in terms of best practice they had informally consulted Historic Scotland on the CAC application. When commenting on this, Historic Scotland had raised some concerns about the development, and while the council confirmed that these concerns were considered as part of the planning process they accepted that the concerns raised by Historic Scotland should have been reflected in the CAC application report.

After taking independent advice from a planning adviser, we did not uphold Mr C's complaint. We found that the report on the application demonstrated that all planning considerations had been fully considered, as had the issues raised by Historic Scotland. However, we felt that Historic Scotland 's comments should have been included in both reports and we drew our views on this to the attention of the council.

Mr C also said that the council had unreasonably sought comments from Historic Scotland after the applications had been determined. We were satisfied that, in line with procedures, the council had notified Historic Scotland of their intention to grant consent for a CAC application after the committee meeting, giving Historic Scotland the opportunity to call-in the application if they disagreed with the council's decision. In this case Historic Scotland did not call the application in to Scottish Ministers. While we did not uphold the complaint, we drew to the council's attention that it would be good practice for the report on the CAC application to have explained that the decision to grant consent would be subject to notification to Historic Scotland.

Summary

Mr C complained that the council failed to take action against a neighbour who had applied for planning permission for a house in a field beside Mr C's home. Mr C was concerned that the applicant described the land in an earlier application for planning permission in principle as 'agricultural' and in a recent application for approval of detailed permission as 'paddock'. Mr C was of the view that the applicant was untruthful on his application and land ownership certification. He also complained that the council did not refer the application to the appropriate committee and so it was decided by the head of planning under delegated powers.

We did not uphold Mr C's complaints. We reviewed the council's actions and determined that, although the land was described in two different ways, certification about agricultural use was not required as this was not a tenanted piece of land. In addition, as it was within the settlement boundary and not in open countryside, the use of land was not relevant to the application. In terms of the council's decision not to require the application to be considered at committee, their standing orders require this to be done where more than five objections are received to a planning application. However, they treat separate objections coming from the same household as one objection, which they are entitled to do. In this case as five objections were received from three households, we were of the view that the council's interpretation of this as a total of three objections was reasonable.