The Ombudsman's final decision
Summary: We will not investigate this complaint about a home to school transport application. There is no significant injustice from any fault by the Council, and it is unlikely that further investigation would lead to a different outcome.
The complaint
Mr X complained the Council did not properly consider his application, on behalf of his child, for free home to school transport.
Mr X also said there was significant delay in the Council considering his appeals against their decision not to award free home to school transport.
Mr X said this has affected him financially
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 injustice is not significant enough to justify our involvement, or further investigation would not lead to a different outcome, we cannot achieve the outcome someone wants (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended, section 34(B))
How I considered this complaint
I considered information provided by Mr X and the Council.
I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.
I considered the Home-to-School Travel statutory guidance 2014
My assessment
Mr X’s application for free home to school transport first sought travel passes for him and his child.
The Council told Mr X that it does not issue travel passes to parents for home to school transport. It also apologised for the delay in responding to the application for his child, and attributed the delay to the volume of applications and appeals it was handling.
Mr X then appealed the Council’s decision not to award a free travel pass. The Council upheld its decision not to award the child a free travel pass, explained its reasons and apologised for the delay in responding to the appeal.
Mr X sought a stage two appeal. The Council responded to say it would not progress Mr X’s complaint to stage two as there was no new evidence or information for an independent appeal panel to consider.
The Council did not apparently follow its home to school transport policy when deciding not to call a stage two appeal panel.
However, there are evidently no exceptional circumstances that would support the application. I have considered medical reasons, faith school attendance, and low-income.
Mr X has not suffered any significant injustice from any fault in the way the Council considered his free home to school transport application and appeal.
There is no significant outcome that we could achieve by investigating as we cannot instruct the Council to award Mr X’s child a free travel pass. And in any case, the Council apologised for earlier delays and explained why this was and further investigation would not lead to a different outcome.
Final decision
We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint because there is no significant injustice from any fault by the Council, and it is unlikely that further investigation would lead to a different outcome.
Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman