The Ombudsman's final decision
Summary: We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint about the Council’s decision on the new location for him to present his bins for collection. There is not enough evidence of fault by the Council to warrant an investigation. Even if there were fault, there is not enough evidence the matters complained of cause Mr X such a significant personal injustice to justify our involvement.
The complaint
Mr X lives on a short unadopted road. He complains the Council: moved his and his neighbours’ bin collection point to an unacceptable and dangerous location; refused to consider an alternative location for the collection point; delayed in providing him with a new bin trolley system.
Mr X says he has had to deal with complaints from other neighbours about the new bin collection point. He says the bin crew required him to bring his bins to the new location for them to be collected, which he found embarrassing. Mr X has spent time on the matter and has been caused stress by it. He wants the Council to agree to collect the bins from the alternative location.
The Ombudsman’s role and powers
The Ombudsman investigates complaints about ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’, which we call ‘fault’. We must also consider whether any fault has had an adverse impact on the person making the complaint, which we call ‘injustice’. We provide a free service, but must use public money carefully. We do not start or may decide not to continue with an investigation if we decide: there is not enough evidence of fault to justify investigating, or any fault has not caused injustice to the person who complained, or any injustice is not significant enough to justify our involvement.
(Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6)) We cannot question whether a council’s decision is right or wrong simply because the complainant disagrees with it. We must consider whether there was fault in the way the decision was reached. (Local Government Act 1974, section 34(3), as amended)
How I considered this complaint
I considered information provided by Mr X, and the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.
My assessment
The Environmental Protection Act 1990 gives councils the power to decide where they require residents to present their bins for collection. The Council also has a policy for collections from unadopted roads. Residents of those roads must present their bins for collection from next to or on the adopted highway. Officers have followed the legislation and their policy to reach the decision on where Mr X’s new collection point should be and explained the reasons for their decision to him.
I recognise Mr X considers an alternative collection point he has proposed would only require bin staff to walk a few steps further to collect the bins, adding just a small amount of time to the crew’s round in respect of Mr X’s bins. But this is a request for a preferential service compared to that received by other residents of unadopted roads. The Council’s legitimate aim is to provide consistent and equal service levels to residents on such roads, so as not to increase the total time taken for bin rounds to be completed, in line with its policy requiring them all to present their bins on or next to an adopted highway.
We can only go behind a council decision if there has been fault in the way it has been made which, but for that fault, officers would have made a different decision. There is not enough evidence of fault in the Council’s decision here for us to criticise it. I recognise Mr X disagrees with it. But it is not fault for a council to properly make a decision with which someone disagrees.
Even if there were Council fault here, the matter does not cause Mr X such a significant personal injustice to him to warrant us investigating. The additional distance to the new collection point for Mr X to move his bins once a week is not a sufficient injustice to him to justify our involvement. The other injustices X mentions related to the matter Mr are not so significant to warrant our further involvement. Mr X refers in his complaint to various concerns or issues of neighbours he says have been or may be caused by the collection point change, but those are not his personal injustices.
Mr X has raised the Council’s delay in providing him with a new trolley system for some of his refuse. He initially declined the new system but then agreed to use it. In any event, whether by using the trolley system or the older scheme, Mr X has continued to receive his refuse collection service. So any delay in Mr X receiving his trolley system caused by the Council has not led to a significant personal injustice to him which would warrant us investigating.
Final decision
We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint because: there is not enough evidence of fault by the Council to warrant an investigation; even if there were fault, there is not enough evidence the matters complained of caused Mr X such a significant personal injustice to justify us investigating.
Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman