Is the complaint about action which affects all or most of the inhabitants of the area?

Section 26(7) covers this. Also see examples.

The type of complaint that is clearly out of jurisdiction is where the complainant complains that a particular council project is a waste of public money and that his or her only injustice is that he or she suffers as a council tax payer. In the decision letter, investigators should mention the possibility of contacting the district auditor.

Notes

A good test is to ask if the complainant is particularly affected by the alleged maladministration, ie has he or she suffered some injustice above and beyond that suffered by the public generally.

Very few actions will affect all of the inhabitants. As to how many are “most”, it is suggested that it means more than half, ie the majority; therefore a complaint about council tax will affect “most”.

Some failure in public services that are available to all but used by comparatively few (eg failure to maintain a particular footpath) are not caught by this section as in reality most of the inhabitants of an area are not affected by the failure.

The area of authority means the whole of the local government area, eg the whole county or whole district.

The section refers to the local Commissioner’s “opinion”. So long as the question is considered properly and fairly the opinion would be unlikely to be open to a successful challenge.

A complaint may be expressed in a way that is caught by the section eg “the old persons’ home next door to me is a waste of money”. But this formulation may disguise a complaint which would be within jurisdiction and so the investigator may need to seek clarification from the complainant. This may reveal a legitimate complaint such as that he or she was not consulted before the council built an old persons’ home next to them which affects their privacy.

Date Updated: 02/08/10