The Ombudsman's final decision
Summary: We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint about the Council’s handling of a penalty charge notice. This is because Mr X has used his right of appeal to the Traffic Penalty Tribunal.
The complaint
Mr X complains the Council issued him a penalty charge notice (PCN) but did not affix the paper Notice to his far. He says this prevented him from considering whether to pay the PCN at the original discounted rate. He then made representations against the PCN to the Council and appealed to the Traffic Penalty Tribunal but says the Council failed to provide him with information he wanted for his appeal. He also complains about the Council’s handling of his complaint and says a council officer called him a liar.
The Ombudsman’s role and powers
The Local Government Act 1974 sets out our powers but also imposes restrictions on what we can investigate.
We cannot investigate a complaint if someone has appealed to a tribunal about the same matter. We also cannot investigate a complaint if in doing so we would overlap with the role of a tribunal to decide something which has been or could have been referred to it to resolve using its own powers. (Local Government Act 1974, section 26(6)(a), as amended) The Traffic Penalty Tribunal considers parking and moving traffic offence appeals for all areas of England outside London.
The Information Commissioner's Office considers complaints about freedom of information. Its decision notices may be appealed to the First Tier Tribunal (Information Rights). So where we receive complaints about freedom of information, we normally consider it reasonable to expect the person to refer the matter to the Information Commissioner.
How I considered this complaint
I considered information provided by Mr X and the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.
My assessment
Because Mr X has appealed to the Traffic Penalty Tribunal we cannot consider any complaint about the issue of the PCN or the Council’s handling of Mr X’s appeal against it. Mr X confirms he raised concerns about the conduct of the council officer with the Tribunal and this also overlaps with his concerns about not receiving the original PCN. If Mr X was concerned about the Council’s failure to respond to his ‘freedom of information’ request it would have been reasonable for him to complain to the Information Commissioner and he could have brought the issue to the attention of the Adjudicator as part of his appeal.
However, even if the complaint was within our jurisdiction it is unlikely we would investigate it. This is because the amount of the penalty charge was only £70 and the difference between the full and discounted rates was £35. These amounts are not significant enough to warrant investigation and we cannot achieve the outcome Mr X wants, which is to provide him with a fresh appeal.
Mr X is also unhappy with the way the Council dealt with his complaint. But it is not a good use of public resources to look at the Council’s complaints handling if we are not going to look at the substantive issue complained about. We will not therefore investigate this issue separately.
Final decision
We cannot investigate this complaint. This is because Mr X has used his right of appeal to the Traffic Penalty Tribunal.
Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman