Localism Bill

Baroness Hanham Excerpts

Wednesday 7th September 2011 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Hanham]

My Lords, it has been a very interesting and helpful debate, mostly coming from people who understand the process in place at the moment. There has been a lot of talk about arbitration. However, this is not about arbitration; it is about resolution. It is about somebody having a problem and needing it resolved. They need somebody to write a letter to the housing chairman. They need somebody to write a letter because they have been through the process and they have not got a reasonable answer. As former councillors, we have all done precisely this and made sure that there is some means of resolving a problem for tenants. To say that councillors, MPs, and now tenants cannot do this seems absurd.

One of the reasons for suggesting that people take their complaints through one of those filters—if that is what they are—is, as my noble friend Lord Tope said, that there is a strong belief that removing housing by and large from the direct control and interest of councils and taking it to ALMOs and housing associations means that councillors and MPs become disconnected from the problems. Councillors in particular ought to know what is going on in the housing stock in their borough. I am sure the noble Baroness, Lady Hollis, knows exactly what she is doing and has a very good complaints procedure. I am not sure that is true of every ALMO or even of the way council properties are run. So we want to reconnect councillors and MPs with what is going wrong within their area. Can we dump the suggestion of arbitration? Nobody is asking them to arbitrate. We are asking them to resolve a problem. If they cannot resolve the problem, they would be required to pass the matter on to the Local Government Ombudsman with the agreement of the complainant.

I do not want there to be any misunderstanding. We recognise that the Housing Ombudsman does an extremely good job. There is no doubt about that. It is responsive and it knows what it is doing. This is not about trying to exclude the ombudsman from the system. But the Housing Ombudsman has an enormous case load which went up by 72 per cent between 2007-08 and 2009-10. Maybe that reflects the fact that there are more complaints coming forward about housing, which could be dealt with locally if there was the opportunity to do so. An additional 11 per cent of complaints have been made in the past year.

We want to ensure that the ombudsman is not the first port of call. We do not want the immediate response to be, “Oh, I’m going off to the ombudsman”. There should be a step before that; namely, going to one’s tenants panel, a councillor or an MP and seeing whether the matter can first be resolved through them.

A dual-track model currently applies to complaints to the Local Government Ombudsman. In practice, although the ombudsman does not collect detailed statistics, complaints are almost always submitted directly to the ombudsman and not via local councillors. Therefore, we are not convinced that this model will help local complaint resolution.

I have listened carefully to what has been said and I know that these matters have been raised over a number of weeks. I understand what has been said about discussions passing a last barrier point between the council or tenants panel to the ombudsman. I am not clear that dual track increases the number of ways of resolving complaints, but I have heard what has been said. Bearing in mind what was said by the noble Lords, Lord Greaves and Lord Tope, and my noble friends Lord True and Lady Eaton, who all see the advantage of an initial stage, I am happy to look again at the second stage and how a matter would get to the ombudsman. I give a commitment to do that before the next stage of the Bill so that we can discuss how we think that could take over. We feel that this would be a good way to proceed. I hope that both my noble friends and the noble Lords opposite will be content for us to see whether there is a way through here without absolutely undermining the provisions that the Government wish to introduce. The Government believe that local people who are associated with local housing and have become disconnected from it should be aware of what is going on and be capable of dealing with a lot of the problems that tenants have without them having to approach the ombudsman.

My offer is one of discussions to see whether there is a way through. If we have not found one by Third Reading, we will be able to deal with the matter then. On that basis, I hope that noble Lords will not press their amendments.

[Lord Kennedy of Southwark]

My Lords, does the Minister accept that what has been proposed would enable tenants to keep their right to decide whether they want to go through their councillor or MP or go directly to the ombudsman? What the Government are proposing denies them that choice. That is the problem that we have on this side of the House.

[Baroness Hanham]

My Lords, I do not think that it denies them the choice. I am happy to look into how the passing from one to the other can be done. We think that there should be an initial stage. Often, those initial stages work: a councillor intervenes; they see what is going on; and the matter is resolved at that level. If that does not happen and somebody goes directly to the ombudsman, it is very difficult for councillors and tenants panels to know exactly what people are thinking. People do not always want to go to the ombudsman and would quite like somebody to deal with the matter at a local level. That is why we think the initial responsibility for getting matters put right lies with one of those three groups. I am very happy to look at how we can deal with the question of whether it is a requirement for the MP or local councillor to be the final arbiter of when a matter is passed on to the local ombudsman.

[Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for her response and, indeed, I thank all noble Lords who have spoken. We all support the idea that the service provider should be the first person to solve the matter and that there should be good ways of doing so. We all prefer local resolution and we all want councillor involvement. I do not think that there is anything between us on that. The only difference is in whether an extra layer should be added and whether we want a veto regarding whether people can, after that extra layer, go to the Housing Ombudsman.

Obviously I am addressing myself to those who I think have already reached a compromise. I hope that they have not, because some problems remain with the amendments, which may not now be moved. One, which has not yet been covered, is that the complaint is still required to be made in writing. Part of our amendment was intended to remove that requirement. I realise that we are on Report rather than in Committee, and therefore that may be a possibility. However, it would be a new statutory requirement. It would go against good practice and, indeed, the Law Commission has specifically recommended against it. Its latest report on public service ombudsmen states:

“We recommend that all formal, statutory requirements that complaints submitted to the public service ombudsmen be written are repealed”.

That is because of vulnerable consumers.

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Moved by

[Baroness Hanham]

61: Schedule 16, page 381, line 15, at end insert—
“Housing (Scotland) Act 2010 (asp 17)59A The Housing (Scotland) Act 2010 is amended as follows.
59B In section 18(2) (co-operation with other regulators: definition of “relevant regulators”) in paragraph (a) for “the Office for Tenants and Social Landlords” substitute “the Regulator of Social Housing”.
59C In section 68(3) (determination of accounting requirements for registered social landlords: consultation with other bodies) in paragraph (c) for “the Office for Tenants and Social Landlords” substitute “the Regulator of Social Housing”.
Equality Act 2010 (c. 15)59D In Schedule 19 to the Equality Act 2010 (public authorities) omit the entry for the Office for Tenants and Social Landlords.”

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[Lord Greaves]

My Lords, we discussed this issue at some length when debating a previous group of amendments. The Minister gave a clear assurance that we can have discussions before Third Reading. I hope that we can come to some consensus. On that basis, there is nothing more that I need to say.

[Baroness Hanham]

My Lords, I am in an interesting position. I offered discussions when debating the last group of amendments, but the offer was rejected forcibly by the vote. I have now been asked whether I will have discussions on these amendments, and I am happy to say that I am content to have them.

[Lord Greaves]

I think that that was an acceptable answer. I understand that we cannot bring back the amendment that was defeated in the vote, but there are plenty of things in these amendments that we can talk about in relation to what the Bill states. That gives us sufficient leeway to talk about what we want to talk about. Whether the Government will extend their offer of discussions to the Opposition, who rudely threw it back in their face on the previous group of amendments, I do not know. I would welcome their participation, but that is up to the Government.

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[Lord Greaves]

These are all interventions on my speech, but that is quite all right. I happily give way to the Minister.

[Baroness Hanham]

I will try to dig us out of this muddle. I am happy to have discussions and to include the Opposition. The discussions might be overshadowed slightly by the way in which we proceed on these amendments. However, it is perfectly proper that we should have them and include everybody.