The Ombudsman's final decision
Summary: We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint about how the Council considered a councillor conduct complaint. This is because there is insufficient evidence of fault to justify our involvement.
The complaint
Mr X complained to the Monitoring Officer about an inaccurate statement in an appeal document prepared by a councillor on behalf of a parish council, which he said that prevented him from taking part in the appeal. He also complained about an inaccurate statement by the parish council.
Mr X said that, as a result of the Monitoring Officer’s failure to investigate and require the councillor to retract their statement, he had been libelled and this had affected his ability to run his business.
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.
(Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended, section 34(B))
How I considered this complaint
I considered information provided by Mr X.
I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.
My assessment
The Council’s Monitoring Officer is responsible for considering complaints that an elected member has breached the Members’ Code of Conduct. Each council has different rules for dealing with complaints about code of conduct breaches.
The Ombudsman does not provide an appeal against the Monitoring Officer’s decisions. We are also unable to investigate or comment on 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 disagrees with it.
The Monitoring Officer considered whether the complaint met the legal jurisdiction criteria test. This covers, amongst other things, whether the person complained about was a councillor at the relevant time, whether they were acting in their capacity as a councillor and whether the complaint amounts to dissatisfaction with a decision, policy or priority of the Council or parish council. After making an initial enquiry, the Monitoring Officer found that the councillor was not involved in preparing the appeal document complained about and that the complaint amounted to dissatisfaction with a parish council decision. Since the criteria for investigating the complaint was not met, the Monitoring Officer decided to take no further action.
The Monitoring Officer followed the Council’s procedure for considering Code of Conduct complaints and provided a clear reason for their decision in writing. There is insufficient evidence of fault to justify our involvement so we will not consider the complaint further.
Final decision
We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint because there is insufficient evidence of fault.
Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman