Birmingham housing: City Council receive 500 applications a week to join register

Birmingham City Council is receiving 500 applications a week to join its housing register.

An investigation by the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman (LGSCO) reveals the high number of families trying to join councils’ housing lists.

The coronavirus pandemic has intensified existing problems, “widened cracks” and contributed to the most difficult time in several years for local authorities nationally, according to the LGSCO.

The body looks at complaints about councils and some other authorities, such as adult social care providers and education appeal panels.

Housing sector complaints

Figures from the LGSCO show that the highest number of concerns about Birmingham City Council (102) involved housing.

Following one family’s complaint about their situation, the investigation from the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman shows that Birmingham City Council was receiving 500 applications a week to join its housing register.

Of those applications nearly half would be eligible to join, meaning 225 families are added to its list every week.

The Ombudsman’s investigation into the family’s complaint found the council struggling to process applications quickly enough – it took six months for it to look at the family’s situation. Ideally, councils should consider applications within six weeks. However, the council currently takes an average of 22 weeks to do this.

Because of the delay, the LGSCO says the council should have backdated the family’s position on the waiting list to the day they applied, meaning they would have been higher up the priority list, but it did not do this.

Michael King, Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman, said:“We understand that many council housing departments are under a lot of pressure as demand is outstripping availability of social housing, and we are aware that in certain areas this unprecedented demand is creating a backlog.

“Councils need to ensure they are providing the right advice at the right time to families to try to either prevent families becoming homeless, or give advice and support with other housing solutions that may be available to them.

“While we can’t say this family has been disadvantaged by the council’s delay in dealing with applications, we are concerned potentially thousands of other families in the city might have been.

“I welcome the steps the council has already taken to address these issues, and its ready agreement to our recommendations to improve its services further.”

A Birmingham City Council spokesperson said: “We apologise to the complainant and will ensure that the ombudsman’s recommendations are carried out in full. This case highlights the pressure that Birmingham City Council is under in seeking to meet the housing needs of our citizens.

“We have already taken steps, including additional resources, to address the time that it has been taking in order to assess applications to the housing register. We are pleased to say that those waiting times are reducing, and there is a plan in place to bring these in line with our service standards.”

More than 300 complaints lodged

The figures from the LGSCO also show that more than 300 complaints about Birmingham City Council were lodged last year.

362 complaints or enquiries about Birmingham City Council were lodged in the year to March, though the ombudsman was closed to new complaints between March and June 2020.

That was down from 561 the year before.

Different data shows 130 cases deemed to warrant a full investigation by the LGSCO were concluded in 2020-21, with 107 resulting in a complaint being upheld against the council.

The reasons for the complaints were not provided.

There were 102 concerns over housing. There were 40 cases related to adult social care.

A spokesman for Birmingham City Council, said: “Birmingham City Council is the largest local authority provider of social housing in the country, maintaining over 60,000 properties and dealing with over 400 housing enquiries a week.

“Throughout the pandemic we maintained all our housing services, however during the emergency phase certain services were restricted. Since restrictions have eased we have stepped up our response across all of housing and have recently launched a new housing solutions service.”

The national picture

Education and children’s services were the subject of the largest proportion of complaints and enquiries nationally, with more than 2,300 lodged last year.

A further 1,700 related to planning and development while more than 1,600 were about adult social care.

At the height of the first lockdown, the ombudsman was closed to new cases and halted ongoing investigations.

Pandemic-related disruption contributed to a significant drop in complaints and enquiries across England, with 11,800 received – down from 17,000 the year before.

But the proportion of all cases upheld nationally has grown and was 67% in 2020-21, compared to 61% in 2019-20.

That proportion was even higher for adult social care complaints, at 72%, up from 69%.

Assessments and care planning were the most common areas of complaint in relation to adult social care.

Michael King, local government and social care ombudsman, said the figures showed investigators were finding fault more often.

He added: “While the way local authorities dealt with the pressures of Covid-19 is still being played out in our casework, early indications suggest it is only widening the cracks that were already there.”

He said the concerns “cannot be wholly attributed to the trials of the pandemic.”

The LGSCO said the growing percentage of upheld social care cases nationally reflected a “relentless rise” in the proportion of cases where care users and their families were let down by local services.

Mr King said the adult social care system was progressively failing to deliver for those who need it most.

A spokesman for the Local Government Association, which represents councils, said authorities and care providers had been doing all they could to keep “already severely stretched” services going throughout the pandemic.

He added: “It is right that providers continue to work with the ombudsman in its investigations, to make improvements to their services.

“We also need to apply the lessons learnt from our response to Covid-19 in any future reforms.”

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