The Ombudsman's final decision
Summary: We will not investigate this complaint about the Council’s dealings with a local charity. Some of the complaint is late and there is no reason the complaint could not have been brought to us sooner. It is also unlikely we could add anything to the Council’s responses and there is not enough evidence of fault to warrant an investigation.
The complaint
The complainant, Mrs X, who represents a charity, complained about a lack of support from the Council. Mrs X says the Council failed to provide financial support it had promised or recognition for work the charity carried out during the COVID-19 pandemic. Mrs X complained council officers failed to respond to requests for help. Mrs X is also unhappy with the way the Council dealt with the charity’s applications for permanent premises, including applications via the Community Asset Transfer process.
The Ombudsman’s role and powers
The Local Government Act 1974 sets out our powers but also imposes restrictions on what we can investigate.
We cannot investigate late complaints unless we decide there are good reasons. Late complaints are when someone takes more than 12 months to complain to us about something a council has done. (Local Government Act 1974, sections 26B and 34D, as amended) 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 continue an investigation if we decide: there is not enough evidence of fault to justify investigating, 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, or there is no worthwhile outcome achievable by our investigation.
(Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended, section 34(B))
How I considered this complaint
I considered information provided by the complainant and the Council.
I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.
My assessment
We will not start an investigation into Mrs X’s complaint.
Some of Mrs X’s complaint relates to matters which took place more than twelve months ago. This includes events during the COVID-19 pandemic and applications for permanent premises in 2021 and 2022.
The Ombudsman normally expects people to complain to us within twelve months of them becoming aware of a problem. We look at each complaint individually, and on its merits, considering the circumstances of each case. But we do not exercise discretion to accept a late complaint unless there are good reasons to do so. I do not consider that to be the case here. I see no reason why Mrs X could not have complained much earlier and so the exception at paragraph 3 applies to this part of her complaint.
Even if the above events were not late, it is unlikely we would investigate. There is either not enough evidence of fault by the Council or we could not establish what council officers told Mrs X due to the time which has now elapsed.
More recent events complained about are not outside the 12-month period I refer to above. I understand Mrs X’s frustrations her charity has not been successful in its bids for support from the Council. But this is not enough to warrant us investigating. The Council has explained its decisions to Mrs X, and without more evidence of fault by the Council, an investigation by the Ombudsman is not warranted.
Final decision
We will not investigate Mrs X’s complaint. Some of the issues are late, it is unlikely we could add anything to the Council’s responses, and there is not enough evidence of fault.
Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman