Summary: We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint about the Council not buying them pain relief. There is not enough evidence of fault to justify our involvement.

The complaint

1. Mr X complained the Council did not buy him pain relief following a dental procedure. He said it wrongly concluded he might misuse the medication. He said the Council’s decision resulted in him being left in pain.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

2. 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.

(Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended, section 34(B))

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How I considered this complaint

3. I considered information provided by the complainant and the Council.
4. I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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My assessment

5. In the Council’s complaint response, it confirmed it supported Mr X to buy pain relief immediately following the dental procedure. Mr X emailed the Council for additional pain relief several days later. He then sent a further message in which he referred to being on the “limit of overdosing painkillers”. The Council decided not to purchase Mr X more pain relief.
6. Although Mr X is unhappy with how the Council acted, we will not investigate this complaint. Given, what Mr X wrote, there is not enough evidence of fault in the Council’s decision not to buy him additional pain relief. In addition, there was nothing preventing Mr X buying his own pain relief, if he had indeed run out.

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Final decision

7. We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint because there is not enough evidence of fault to justify our involvement.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman