The Ombudsman's final decision
Summary: We will not investigate this complaint about the Council refusing to provide Miss X’s son with a virtual blue badge. This is because the complaint does not meet the tests in our Assessment Code on how we decide which complaints to investigate. The injustice to Miss X is not significant enough to warrant an investigation and there is also not enough evidence of fault by the Council.
The complaint
The complainant, Miss X, wants the Council to issue her son with a virtual blue badge (referred to in the Council’s policy as a courtesy blue badge). This would allow Miss X to park on the street close to her home without having to display her son’s physical blue badge. The Council has refused Miss X’s request. It says virtual blue badges are only available to residents in a Controlled Parking Zone (CPZ) without private parking. Because Miss X’s address has private parking, she is not eligible for a virtual blue badge. The Council says Miss X can still park in the CPZ but needs to display the physical badge in her car.
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, 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 this complaint.
While I understand Miss X’s concerns, the claimed injustice is not significant enough to warrant us investigating. Whether Miss X has a virtual badge does not change where she can park. Miss X wants a virtual badge so she does not have to display her son’s physical blue badge. But the injustice from not having a virtual badge is not significant enough to warrant us investigating. Miss X is concerned what might happen to her car if she displays the physical badge. But we cannot consider complaints about what might happen.
The virtual badge scheme is also one locally implemented by the Council. It is for the Council to decide whether to operate such a scheme and its terms and conditions. Where a council acts in line with an agreed policy which has been properly determined we have no powers to intervene. That appears to be the case here.
Final decision
We will not investigate Miss X’s complaint because there is not enough evidence of significant personal injustice or fault by the Council.
Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman