this complaint about the Council’s failure to maintain highway gullies near Mr X’s home. There is insufficient evidence of significant personal injustice which would warrant an investigation.
The complaint
Mr X complained about the Council’s failure to clear highway gullies near his home. As a result, he says puddles occur after rain which make it inconvenient due to traffic splashing the water.
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 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 the information provided by the complainant and the Council’s response.
I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.
My assessment
Mr X reported blocked gullies on the road to the Council but says he did not receive response or see any action take place. He made a formal complaint about the lack of action and the Council wrote to him apologising and advising that it proposed to carry out work in the coming weeks. The Council needed to contact householder to ensure cars were not obstructing the gullies when the works were scheduled.
Mr X says the two gullies nearest his home are situated in yellow line restrictions and will not be parked over. Whilst this may be the case the yellow lined area is only very small and the length of the road has several gullies where parking takes place on both sides and which the Council would need access to.
In late March the Council told Mr X to contact it again if he had not received a notification letter of the works by 21 April. However, he complained to us on 2 April which was before any works could begin.
There is no statutory timescale for clearing highway gullies. Most highway authorities have a schedule of maintenance according to the type of road and any previous flooding affecting property. They also have a reactive service for reported cases of blockages. This is the service which the Council has proposed and it is for the highway authority to arrange this with co operation of residents in relation to parking.
Our role is to consider complaints where the person bringing the complaint has suffered significant personal injustice as a direct result of the actions or inactions of the organisation. This means 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. We will not normally investigate a complaint where the alleged loss or injustice is not a serious or significant matter.
Final decision
We will not investigate this complaint about the Council’s failure to maintain highway gullies near Mr X’s home. There is insufficient evidence of significant personal injustice which would warrant an investigation.
Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman