The Ombudsman's final decision
Summary: We will not investigate this complaint about the Council’s handling of a road closure as there is insufficient injustice caused to the complainant to justify our further involvement.
The complaint
Mr X complained about poor planning of a major event and road closure which led to him being stuck in traffic for 90 minutes. Mr X wants a review of the Council’s process, a public apology, staff involved to be disciplined and a monetary payment for himself.
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 any fault has not caused significant injustice to the person who complained, or further investigation would not lead to a different outcome (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended, section 34(B))
How I considered this complaint
I considered information provided by the complainant.
I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.
My assessment
In its complaint responses to Mr X, the Council accepted there had been fault in its handling of this matter and apologised for this. The Council acknowledged that more support could have been given to the event organiser to ensure better, prior communication of the road closure and that some signage, giving advance warning of the closures, had not been put in place. The Council said it would ensure these issues would be addressed for next year’s event.
While I recognise Mr X was impacted by being stuck in traffic, from our perspective this does not represent a level of loss or harm that would warrant our further involvement. We have limited resources and must use public money carefully. I do not consider it would be in the public interest to investigate this complaint, and this also takes into account the fact that the Council has acknowledged it was at fault and has committed to ensure improvements. It is unlikely we could change the outcome of the complaint and the injustice to Mr X is not at a level that would justify us asking the Council to make a financial remedy payment for.
For these reasons, we will not investigate.
Final decision
We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint because he is not caused serious loss or harm from any Council fault and our further involvement would not be justified.
Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman