The Ombudsman's final decision
Summary: We will not investigate this complaint about the Council’s handling of Ms X’s Code of Conduct complaint made against a local councillor. This is because an investigation is unlikely to find evidence of fault by the Council sufficient to warrant an investigation and because we cannot achieve the outcome Ms X seeks.
The complaint
The complainant, who I refer to as Ms X, says the Council delayed unreasonably in addressing her Code of Conduct complaint and that when it did so it carried out an inadequate and unprofessional investigation. She wants an investigation into the councillor for unduly influencing the outcome of her planning applications and for the councillor to be removed from all positions of authority and influence.
The Ombudsman’s role and powers
We investigate 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, or we could not add to any previous investigation by the organisation, or further investigation would not lead to a different outcome, or we cannot achieve the outcome someone wants. (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6)) The law says we cannot normally investigate a complaint when someone can appeal to a government minister. The Planning Inspector acts on behalf of the responsible Government minister. (Local Government Act 1974, section 26(6)(b))
How I considered this complaint
I considered information provided by Ms X and the Council.
I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.
My assessment
There was delay by the Council in responding to Ms X’s Code of Conduct complaint for which it apologised. We do not investigate every complaint we receive and here neither the delay nor the injustice caused to Ms X as a result of it is sufficient to warrant a formal investigation by the Ombudsman.
With regards to the investigation carried out by the Council, it decided there was insufficient evidence to conclude a breach of the Code had taken place, particularly as Ms X had claimed the councillor had pre-determined her applications when in fact they had been decided by officers under delegated powers and not by planning committee.
We do not offer a right of appeal against council decisions on member conduct complaints. While we can consider if there was fault in the way the Council considered the complaint, we will only do so if there is sufficient injustice to warrant our involvement or we consider it in the public interest to do so.
As the Council pointed out to Ms X, if she had been unhappy with the decisions taken by the Council on her planning applications, she could have appealed to the Planning Inspectorate.
Moreover, even if we investigated Ms X’s complaint, the outcome she seeks is not one an investigation by the Ombudsman can achieve.
Final decision
We will not investigate Ms X’s complaint because an investigation is unlikely to find evidence of fault by the Council sufficient to warrant an investigation and because we cannot achieve the outcome Ms X seeks.
Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman