Page 115 - Solving Housing Disputes

“authorised tribunal staff” to conduct an array of procedural functions
328
historically the fiefdom of judges but as yet, authorised court staff in the
County Court have not been delegated procedural functions through practice
statement. Our proposal for the HCRS will require procedural functions to be
delegated to County Court staff. To give effect to the triage function of case
workers under the HCRS, the Civil Procedure Rule Committee should bring
forward consideration as to what procedural functions “authorised court
staff” should exercise within the County Court.

4.35 Further, we recommend that those staff should be able to assess whether the
person’s dispute is within jurisdiction and, if need be, to refer disputes
which are, in fact, maladministration claims to housing redress schemes,
329
and vice versa. Currently, the Housing Ombudsman and the Local
Government & Social Care Ombudsman, which have split jurisdictions
regarding complaints about local authority housing functions, have a
Memorandum of Understanding to deal with disputes which have been brought
to the wrong body, queries about whose jurisdiction applies and complaints
330
where there are separate issues which engage both jurisdictions. Similar cross-
referring arrangements will be needed for the HCRS. Various redress providers
operating within the HCRS should, to the extent practicable, look to standardise
the front end, assistive role carried out by case handlers. The Redress Reform
Working Group provides an opportunity to do so, and it may be that the body we
propose at paragraph 4.12 could assist in that regard.

4.36 The Redress Reform Working Group should work collaboratively to
establish universal coverage of housing complaints, by making
arrangements for all jurisdictions to be capable of cross-referring disputes
to each other, recommending rule changes where necessary, and devolving
functions to court and tribunal staff to facilitate such referrals.

328 Ibid.

329 On this, see Sir Ernest Ryder, ‘Driving improvements: collaboration and peer learning; Ombudsman
Association conference’ (Belfast, 21 May 2019) p. 3 available at https://www.judiciary.uk/wp-
content/uploads/2019/09/2019_09_19_SPT_Ombudsman_Conference_-Belfast_May2019_FINAL-
2.pdf

330 Available at https://www.housing-ombudsman.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/lgsco-hos-
mou.pdf

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