The Ombudsman's final decision
Summary: We will not investigate this complaint about the Council’s handling of a road closure. This is because neither the fault by the Council nor the injustice caused to Mr X is sufficient to warrant an investigation.
The complaint
The complainant, who I refer to as Mr X, says the Council allowed his road to be closed overnight for roadworks at the time it was due to be used as a diversion route following a motorway closure. This led to a substantial number of vehicles using his driveway to turn around and the Council has not agreed to his request that he be consulted about future grants for roadworks in his road.
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 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. (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6))
How I considered this complaint
I considered information provided by Mr X, including the Council’s responses to his complaint.
I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.
My assessment
In response to Mr X’s complaint about its decision to allow the closure of his road overnight when it was due to be used as a diversion for motorway traffic, the Council acknowledged it had made an error and apologised to Mr X for this. It told him it had put robust measures in place to ensure the same errors would not be repeated. However, it made clear that legally it could not pass its decision-making powers to him and nor would it wish to.
While I understand Mr X has been inconvenienced by road closures affecting his road, neither the Council’s fault nor his injustice is sufficient to warrant an investigation. Moreover, the outcome he seeks for his complaint is not one we can achieve.
Final decision
We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint because neither the fault by the Council nor the injustice caused to Mr X is sufficient to warrant an investigation.
Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman