The Ombudsman's final decision
Summary: We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint about the Council not responding to his requests for information about a planning issue.
It is reasonable for Mr X to pursue the matter by making a freedom of information (FOI) request to the Council. If he is not satisfied with the outcome, he may raise it with the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) which is the body best placed to deal with FOI issues. We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint about the Council’s complaints handling in isolation from the core access to information issue.
The complaint
Mr X complains the Council has: failed to respond to his requests for information about a planning issue; intentionally prevented him from pursuing a complaint through its internal complaints process.
The Ombudsman’s role and powers
The Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) considers complaints about freedom of information (FOI).
Its decision notices may be appealed to the First Tier Tribunal (Information Rights). Where we receive complaints about FOI, we normally consider it reasonable to expect the person to refer the matter to the ICO.
The Ombudsman investigates 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 may decide not to continue with an investigation if we decide: it would be reasonable for the person to ask for an organisation review or appeal; there is another body better placed to consider this complaint.
(Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6))
How I considered this complaint
I considered information from Mr X, and the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.
My assessment
Mr X’s core complaint is about access to information he believes is held by the Council, and which he considers it should have disclosed to him or should have already made public.
If the Council has not responded to Mr X’s various information requests, that would be fault. But even if there has been such fault here, we will not investigate the complaint. This is because Mr X has a formal route to pursue the information he has been seeking. He can ask for the material he wants by making an FOI request to the Council. The laws dealing with FOIs place duties on public bodies such as councils to respond to such requests. It is reasonable for Mr X to do this to seek the information he wants from the Council as that is purpose of the FOI legislation put in place by national government.
If Mr X submits an FOI and is not satisfied with the Council’s reply, or the Council does not respond, that would be a matter for the ICO. The ICO is the national body created to consider and decide on FOI and data access issues, applying its expertise in the relevant laws. We will not investigate because the ICO is the body best placed to deal with Mr X’s concerns about the Council’s lack of responses, and with its responses to any future information requests. If Mr X should disagree with any future ICO decision on this matter, he would also have a right to appeal it at the First Tier Tribunal (Information Rights).
Mr X says the Council’s lack of responses prevented him from getting the matter into its internal complaints system. We will not investigate councils’ complaint processes where we are not investigating the core issue which gave rise to the complaint. We do not consider it a good use of our resources to do so. That limitation applies here so we will not pursue this part of Mr X’s complaint
Final decision
We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint because: it is reasonable for him to seek access to the information he wants by making a freedom of information (FOI) request to the Council; and if he is not satisfied with the FOI request outcome, he may raise it with the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO), the body best placed to deal with FOI issues; and we do not investigate complaints about councils’ internal complaint processes where we are not investigating the core issue giving rise to the complaint.
Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman