The Ombudsman's final decision
Summary: We will not investigate this complaint about the way the Council has handled Mr X’s complaints about anti-social behaviour and the ‘community trigger’ process. This is because an investigation is unlikely to achieve anything more to add to the Council’s investigation.
The complaint
Mr X complains about the Council failure to address his complaints about anti-social behaviour properly including the statutory community trigger process.
He says he is in danger, his health and wellbeing are at risk and he has been made virtually homeless. He would like the Community Trigger process to be used properly.
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: we could not add to any previous investigation by the organization.
(Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6))
How I considered this complaint
I considered information provided by the complainant and the Council.
I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.
My assessment
Under the Environmental Protection Act 1990 (EPA), councils have a duty to take reasonable steps to investigate potential ‘statutory nuisances’. Typical things which may be a statutory nuisance include noise from premises or vehicles, equipment or machinery in the street.
The Anti-social Behaviour, Crime and Policing Act 2014 introduced a mechanism to review the handling of complaints of anti-social behaviour (ASB). This is commonly known as the ‘Community Trigger’ process. When a person requests a review, relevant bodies (which may include the council, police and others) should decide whether the local threshold has been met.
A member of the public can also take private action against an alleged nuisance in the magistrates’ court. If the court is persuaded, they are suffering a statutory nuisance, it can order the person or people responsible to take action to stop or limit it.
The crux of Mr X’s complaint appears to be that the ‘community trigger’ process was not followed properly by the Council.
I have seen information showing the Council’s community trigger panel wrote to Mr X to advise there was no substantiating evidence of anti-social behaviour. It noted the Police had closed the case about the damage to the vehicle. And it advised the Council’s ASB team had closed the ASB case back in September 2021 after investigating as it ‘had exhausted all options’.
The Council noted Mr X’s reports of the neighbour using an exercise machine but found the noise complained about did not meet the definition of statutory noise nuisance. It said the monitoring equipment and report from the private investigator revealed the noise as not unreasonable as it consisted of everyday living noise that you could hear probably due to poor sound insulation. And that case law confirmed every day living noise was not actionable by the Council.
It also advised Mr X that he could take his own action against the neighbour in court. And that mediation had been offered but Mr X had declined it.
Finally, it said the review was not appealable due to the lack of corroborating evidence of anti-social behaviour.
The Ombudsman will not investigate as we are unlikely to achieve anything further. The Council has carried out a review under the community trigger process but declined to take further action due to the lack of corroborating evidence. An investigation by the Ombudsman is unlikely to retrieve corroborating evidence so we will not be able to add to the Council’s investigation.
Final decision
We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint because we cannot add to the Council’s investigation.
Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman