A north London council has been slammed by the housing watchdog for presiding over a “culture of apathy” in its complaints handling.

The Housing Ombudsman released its special investigation report into Haringey Council earlier today (July 4).

The watchdog found that there was “a distinct lack of ownership, accountability and intrinsic motivation” from the landlord when handling complaints.

The investigation into Haringey Council was launched after concerns were raised about its approach to leaks, damp and mould.

At the time, three quarters of the cases related to these issues investigated by the ombudsman since the start of the financial year 2021/22 had been upheld.

The latest report is formed of 32 individual investigations over a six-month period. The housing watchdog said that the rate of cases upheld stood at 82%.

Cases investigated included Haringey Council’s withdrawal of services from a resident for a year-long period over claims of unacceptable behaviour.

The resident disputed this and, despite not being able to provide supporting evidence, the landlord persisted in not carrying out repair works.

Some of the other issues identified included unreasonable delays in the council’s response to reports of disrepair and an unwillingness to offer compensation to tenants despite clear evidence of service failure.

In a statement, council leaders claimed that after bringing their housing ‘arms length management organisation’ (ALMO) Homes for Haringey in-house last year they took steps "to improve the quality" of their housing services.

But the Ombudsman’s report found that, almost a year on, “the issues which may have led the landlord to decide to bring its ALMO back in-house have not been addressed”.

In April, Ham&High reported that an elderly widower was forced to flee his Haringey council flat in the middle of the night after his smoke alarm spontaneously combusted.

His grandson claimed that this was the culmination of almost a year’s worth of problems in the flat including leaks and mould.

Along with the release of the latest report, Housing Ombudsman Richard Blakeway gave a scathing assessment of Haringey Council's services, calling the findings “stark” and pointing to “failings across a range of areas”.

He went on to demand “prompt action” from the landlord in addressing the concerns and reiterated that “these poor outcomes need to end”.  

He said: “The landlord recognises the current approach is not working for residents, services or its teams, and that the whole organisation needs to change its approach.

“There was frequently a loss of focus on achieving the right outcome for residents.

“The senior leadership is to be commended for the focus it is bringing to improving housing management and starting to put in place the resources and structures to deliver change.

“We look forward to working with the landlord on these changes.”

In a joint statement, Haringey Council leader Cllr Peray Ahmet and chief executive Andy Donald said: “We fully recognise that residents in Haringey deserve the best possible housing services and after binging our ALMO in-house last summer, it became clear that we were not managing or maintaining our homes as well as we should have been.

“This is why we took the bold decision to invest almost £5 million, one of the largest of its kind in the country, to improve the quality of our services, and introduced a far-reaching Housing Improvement Plan that will act in the best interests of our residents.

“We are focused on giving our tenants and leaseholders good quality, secure homes, so they can have the best chance of a healthy, fulfilled life.

“Residents want to see action being taken and that’s exactly what will happen over the coming weeks, months and years.”