The Ombudsman's final decision
Summary: We will not investigate this complaint about a councillor. There is not enough evidence of fault in how the Council considered the complaint to justify our involvement.
The complaint
Mr X complained the Council did not investigate his concerns about a councillor properly. He said the Council did not address all his complaint and did not consider the evidence he provided. He also said there was factually inaccurate information in the response, which referred to him using three email addresses to contact the Councillor.
Mr X said the Councillor discussed the complaint with other people and made claims about him. He also said the Council has not acknowledged these concerns. He said the Council took six months to respond to his complaint.
Mr X wants the Council to discipline the Councillor for their breaches of their code of conduct.
The Ombudsman’s role and powers
We investigate complaints of injustice caused by ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’. I have used the word fault to refer to these. We consider whether there was fault in the way an organisation made its decision. If there was no fault in how the organisation made its decision, we cannot question the outcome. (Local Government Act 1974, section 34(3), 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 any injustice is not significant enough to justify our involvement.
(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
The Council's Monitoring Officer (MO) is responsible for considering allegations that an elected member has breached the Members' Code of Conduct. The Ombudsman does not provide an appeal against the Monitoring Officer's decisions. We are also unable to investigate or comment on the actions of the councillor complained about. Where a decision has been made in line with the correct procedure, taking account of the relevant evidence, the Ombudsman will generally not criticise the decision, even if the complainant does not agree with it.
Mr X complained to the Council that the Councillor had ignored his emails for six months. He said that was discriminatory. The MO identified which parts of the Code of Conduct were applicable to Mr X’s complaint; they then reviewed the email communication and spoke to the Councillor about the complaint. The Council concluded there was no breach of the code of conduct. It set out its reasons for this.
Although Mr X disagrees, we will not investigate. Firstly, I am satisfied the Council has properly considered Mr X’s complaint and addressed the key points. Although Mr X states he did not use three different emails to contact the Councillor, there is nothing to suggest that would affect the outcome on the Council’s decision. There is not enough evidence of fault to justify our involvement.
In addition, we will normally only investigate a complaint where the complainant has suffered serious loss, harm or distress as a direct result of faults or failures by an organisation. I do not consider Mr X’s concerns about the Councillor, have caused him a significant, personal injustice.
We will also not investigate Mr X’s complaint the Council delayed in providing its complaint response. It is not a good use of public money to investigate complaints about complaint procedures where we are not looking at the substantive matter. In any event, the Council apologised to Mr X for the delay. There is no outstanding significant injustice.
Mr X can make a new complaint to the Council about the Councillor’s conduct if he believes he discussed this complaint with other people and has made false claims about him.
Final decision
We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint because there is not enough evidence of fault in how the Council dealt with the complaint to justify our involvement.
Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman