The Ombudsman's final decision
Summary: We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint about how the Council considered his request to amend the speed limit on sections of road. This is because there is not enough evidence of fault by the Council to justify investigation.
The complaint
Mr X complained the Council failed to properly consider his request to amend the speed limit of specific sections of road. He said this failure posed a danger to pedestrians and he wanted the Council to reduce the speed limit of the relevant sections of 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 or continue 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.
(Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended, section 34(B))
How I considered this complaint
I considered information provided by the complainant and the Council.
I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.
My assessment
Mr X asked the Council to reduce the speed limit on sections of road as he had concerns for the safety of himself and other pedestrians.
The Council considered Mr X’s request and reviewed reports from 2024 which confirmed that no collision reports involving excess speed had been recorded at the locations raised by Mr X. It also confirmed that the average speeds recorded at the locations were very near the speed limit which was in place at the time.
The Council denied Mr X’s request based on this information.
Mr X also raised concerns about a section of road where the speed limit was 40mph. Mr X said there were houses on either side of the road and no footpath, which posed a danger to pedestrians.
The Council considered and shared Mr X’s concerns for this section of road. Whist it found that no collision reports involving excess speed had been recorded at this location, it did request that these concerns be logged and considered for potential improvements to the highway network.
We will not investigate the above matters as there is not enough evidence of fault in the Council’s consideration and action taken in relation to the concerns raised by Mr X.
In any event, we will normally only investigate a complaint where: the complainant has suffered serious loss, harm, or distress as a direct result of faults or failures by the service provider, or there are continuous and ongoing instances of a lower-level injustice that remain unresolved over a long period of time.
Mr X has not suffered serious injustice as a result of these issues.
Final decision
We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint because there is insufficient evidence of fault by the Council to justify investigation.
Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman