Agenda item

The Housing Ombudsman has made a formal recommendation to the Council by way of an order regarding its existing Policy and the Council is obliged to implement that recommendation by way of adoption of an updated Policy.

[25 Minutes]

          Upon the invitation of the Chair, the Group Head of Law and Governance presented the report to the Committee. He explained that as a result of a complaint that went through the Council’s internal complaints process and then to the Housing Ombudsman, various recommendations had been made by the Housing Ombudsman, a number of which related to the policy itself and changes required to it. Some of the recommended changes were as a result of new guidance regarding the updated Complaints Handling Code to be published by the Housing Ombudsman in October. The changes were set out at Appendix 3 in the table. The existing and update policies were also attached to the report. The Group Head of Law and Governance went on to say that he would not go into the details of the complaint as this contained personal information regarding the tenant involved, however, it was felt these changes needed to be made as a result of the outcome of the complaint, and also in order to comply with the revised Complaints Handling Code.

          The Chair explained to Members that this was an update that the Committee were obliged to agree at the request of the Housing Ombudsman. He then invited questions from Members.

          One Member stated that the Housing Ombudsman ruled against the Council and in favour of the complainant, and an explanation of what led to the Officer failings, what the failings were and why they occurred was requested. It was stated that this should be made public. The Group Head of Law and Governance explained that reviewing the complaint was not in the remit of the Audit & Governance Committee but could be a matter for the Housing and Wellbeing Committee to look at. The Member stated that he did not feel the issue was with Housing, but instead with how the complaint had been dealt with by the legal department, which it was agreed would be a matter for Corporate Support to review. The Group Head of Law and Governance confirmed that he would take this matter to the attention of the Lead Officers and Chair of Corporate Support Committee with a view to this being added to the Work Programme for that Committee.

          A typing error in the policy was pointed out, this was on Page 33 of the agenda pack in the bullet points, which contained the word ‘your’ instead of ‘’you are’.

          There was then a discussion regarding the suggested wording on page 7 of the policy at the second to last paragraph, and it was asked why the wording was being changed from ‘All complaints relating to Landlord/Tenant social landlord services will follow the Housing Ombudsman Complaint Handling Code.’ to ‘All complaints relating to Landlord/Tenant social landlord services will have regard to the Housing Ombudsman Complaint Handling Code’. The Group Head of Law and Governance explained that this reflected the usual legal language that should be used in such a policy.

          The recommendation was Proposed by Councillor Chace and Seconded by Councillor Chapman.

          The Committee

RESOLVED

That the Audit & Governance Committee adopts the revised Feedback and Complaints Policy as set out in Appendix 1 of the report.