The Ombudsman's final decision
Summary: We will not investigate this complaint about the Council’s decision to make changes to the highway near Mrs X’s home. There is no significant injustice, and in any case, there is no worthwhile outcome achievable by us investigating.
The complaint
Mrs X said she was unhappy the Council decided to make changes to the highway, including providing additional facilities, on a road near her home. Mrs X was concerned this will mean less off-street parking is available to residents. Mrs X has said this has caused her unnecessary stress.
Mrs X wants the Council to reverse the changes.
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 we cannot achieve the outcome someone wants, or there is no worthwhile outcome achievable by our investigation.
(Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended, section 34(B))
How I considered this complaint
I considered information provided by Mrs X and I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.
My assessment
Mrs X said she was unaware the Council were intending to make alterations to the road near her home, until the works started. Mrs X said this included adding additional facilities and she was concerned this would mean there would be increased non-resident parking on the road and therefore less parking for residents.
The Council replied to Mrs X’s complaint and provided her with information about how it had consulted on its intentions to introduce new facilities. It also said it was not making any changes to the resident permit scheme already in place.
We will not investigate Mrs X’s complaint, because any injustice there may have been, is not at a sufficient level to warrant any further consideration. We will only investigate complaints where a complainant has suffered serious loss, harm, or distress as a direct result of faults or failures by the Council.
In any case, even if there had been serious injustice, we still would not investigate. This is because we could not achieve what Mrs X is seeking from an investigation, which is to have the Council remove the facilities. There is therefore no worthwhile outcome achievable by an investigation.
Final decision
We will not investigate Mrs X’s complaint because any injustice is not significant and there is no worthwhile outcome achievable by us investigating.
Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman