When residents feel their council has failed them and can't get it resolved locally, they can complain to an independent watchdog (the LGSCO). This breaks those complaints down by service — education, housing, social care, benefits and so on. It matters because it shows which part of the council is driving residents to escalate: a high count in one category points to where dissatisfaction is concentrated.
| name | lgsco_complaints_received_<category> |
|---|---|
| dataset | 09-ombudsman-lgsco |
| kind | extracted |
| type | count |
| unit | complaints/year |
| grain | council-year |
| role | feature |
| source | data/lgsco/1-Complaints-Received-{yy}-{yy}.csv, columns `Adult Social Care`, `Benefits and Tax`, `Corporate and Other Services`, `Education and Children's Services`, `Environmental Services, Public Protection and Regulation`, `Highways and Transport`, `Housing`, `Planning and Development`, `Other` |
| period | 2023-24 and 2024-25 editions |
| missingness | Rows exist only for councils in scope of LGSCO; `Upheld decisions per 100,000 residents` and rate columns are blank for zero-decision councils. Percent columns in file 2 are strings like `67%`. Join to Housing Ombudsman data is by name and lossy (ALMO/association names don't match council names). |
| score_note | Per-council category demand split; volume not fault, and overlaps the total and housing-share variables. |
| peer_group | council class (district / county / unitary / metropolitan / London) — not yet scored on the leaderboard |
Complaints received by the LGSCO broken down by service category. Shows which service area is generating escalations for a given council. Category totals sum to lgsco_complaints_received_total.