Summary: Mr B complains that the Council refused his application for a disabled parking badge. The Council was at fault. It failed to fully show how it made its decision, and failed to show that it had properly considered Mr B’s medical evidence. It has agreed to arrange a new mobility assessment.

The complaint

1. The complainant, whom I refer to as Mr B, complains that the Council refused to issue him with a disabled parking badge. He says the Council failed to take his medical conditions into account.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

2. We investigate complaints about ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’. In this statement, I have used the word fault to refer to these. We must also consider whether any fault has had an adverse impact on the person making the complaint. I refer to this as ‘injustice’. If there has been fault which has caused an injustice, we may suggest a remedy. (Local Government Act 1974, sections 26(1) and 26A(1), as amended)
3. If we are satisfied with a council’s actions or proposed actions, we can complete our investigation and issue a decision statement. (Local Government Act 1974, section 30(1B) and 34H(i), as amended)

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How I considered this complaint

4. I considered information from Mr B and the Council. I wrote to Mr B and the Council with my draft decision and considered their comments.

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What I found

5. The Regulations set out which people are entitled to disabled parking badges. Some of these people are automatically eligible.
6. Others are eligible subject to further assessment. These are people who:
• have a severe disability in both upper limbs and cannot turn (by hand) the steering wheel of a motor vehicle even if that wheel is fitted with a turning knob; or
• have a permanent and substantial disability which causes inability to walk or very considerable difficulty in walking.
7. Following amendments to the Regulations in 2011, a person’s eligibility should be confirmed by an independent mobility assessor, unless a council is satisfied that a permanent and substantial disability is self-evident.

The Blue Badge Scheme Local Authority Guidance (2014)

8. This guidance set outs ‘best-practice’ guidance for assessing applicants’ mobility.
9. The guidance sets out several areas which may be relevant in deciding whether an applicant is eligible for a badge. These include excessive pain, breathlessness, distance, and speed. It says, “each application should be considered on its merits – not on a ‘one size fits all’ basis”.
10. The guidance suggests how to assess an applicant’s walking speed. It says:

Brisk pace is equal to at least 90 metres a minute … Normal pace is equal to 61-90 metres a minute … Slow pace is 40-60 metres a minute, and …Very slow pace is less than 40 metres per minute.

11. The guidance says that, if an applicant cannot walk 40 metres in a minute, or can only walk for less than a minute, then walking is likely to be very difficult for them.

What happened

12. Mr B, having submitted an application for a disabled parking badge and provided evidence of his medical conditions (asthma, heart disease and gout), was invited for a face-to-face mobility assessment on 18 October 2018.

The mobility assessment

13. The Council’s assessment form sets out several categories under which each applicant’s walking ability is assessed. It uses a ‘scoring system’ to decide eligibility. It says it uses this system to ensure consistency for applicants.
14. The scoring system is not explained on the form (and was not explained in the Council’s decision letter either). However, each question has four possible answers, on a scale from no difficulty to severe difficulty. It appears that the answers are scored from 0 to 3, depending on the assessed level of difficulty within each category.
15. For an applicant to qualify for a badge, they must score 24 or higher, out of a possible 45 points. An applicant who scored 45 points would display a severe difficulty in every category.
16. The Council’s assessment form says Mr B walked with a slight limp, and had slight balance difficulties (although it does not explain what this means). It says he experienced slight difficulty with standing from a seated position.
17. The form says Mr B displayed ‘moderate’ difficulty with walking speed, and walked slowly, although there is no detail about the speed he walked. It says he walked between 41 and 80 metres, but does not say exactly how far he walked.
18. The form says Mr B had a slight difficulty with breathlessness, and stopped two or three times for 0-30 seconds. It does not make clear whether this was the total time he stopped for, whether there were two or three stops, or the period of each stop. It also does not make clear whether the rest periods were included when working out his walking speed.
19. The form says Mr B experienced moderate pain while walking, and has gout, which it categorised as a moderate lower limb problem. It says he walks with the use of a walking stick.
20. The form says Mr B’s mobility difficulties amounted to a score of 20, and therefore he was not eligible for a disabled parking badge.
21. The Council wrote to Mr B on 19 October and said his badge application had been refused. The decision letter set out a detailed explanation of how it scores applicants, and said his medical conditions “would have been taken into account”. However, the letter does not show a consideration of Mr B’s medical issues.

The review

22. Mr B asked for a review of the Council’s eligibility decision. However, the Council did not overturn its decision and said that, as the mobility assessor had seen that he could walk without great difficulty, he was not eligible for a badge. The Council said it acknowledged his medical condition, but this did not affect its view of his eligibility.

Previous Ombudsman decisions

17 017 541

23. This complaint was about a disabled parking badge assessment which took place on 27 November 2017. We issued our decision on 28 June 2018, and found that:
• The assessment form had no information about the distance or speed the applicant walked;
• There was no evidence that the Council had considered the applicant’s medical evidence during a review; and
• The decision and review letters did not give detailed reasons for refusal.
24. The Council agreed to conduct a new assessment, remind staff members of the need to give detailed feedback, and to check a random sample of case files each month to ensure it was keeping adequate records of assessments.
25. The Council confirmed that these actions had been completed on 17 October 2018.

18 001 429

26. This complaint was about an assessment which took place on 24 April 2018. We issued our decision on 17 October 2018, and found that:
• The assessment form had no information about the distance or speed the applicant walked;
• The assessment form was difficult to understand and it was not clear how the applicant’s score had been worked out; and
• There was no evidence that the Council had considered the applicant’s medical evidence as part of the assessment.
27. The Council agreed to conduct a new assessment.

Analysis

28. It is not my role to decide if someone is eligible for a disabled parking badge. However, I can look at how a council made a decision.
29. The categories the Council considers when assessing applicants are broadly similar to the suggested categories in the government guidance. No important feature of mobility (as suggested by the guidance) is absent from the Council’s assessment form.
30. However, there is a lack of detail about exactly how the Council assessed certain features of Mr B’s mobility. The form does not say:
• what speed Mr B walked, or what ‘slow’ means;
• whether his rests during the walk were included in the overall speed;
• what ‘slight difficulty in balance’ means; or
• exactly how far he walked.
31. To consider whether the Council’s decision was properly made, I must be able to work out how it was made. In Mr B’s case, I cannot, with any confidence, do so. This was fault by the Council.
32. The Council’s decision letter said Mr B’s medical conditions “would have been taken into account”. The decision letter would have been the suitable time to set out the Council’s consideration of these conditions. However, it does not do so, and does not say why Mr B’s medical issues did not justify issuing a badge. Although the assessment form clearly shows that the Council considered his gout, there is no reference to his other conditions.
33. The review letter referred to Mr B’s “medical condition”, but did not say anything about his specific conditions or difficulties. I have had sight of a review letter sent to a different applicant (in early 2019), and the reference to a medical condition appears to be part of the Council’s letter template.
34. While it is not fault for the Council to use templates, it must also show that it has considered an applicant’s individual circumstances. In Mr B’s case, I am not satisfied that it has done so.
35. As a result, I have found fault with the Council. It should remedy Mr B’s injustice from the faults I have found in the assessment and decision letter.
36. The Ombudsman has recently investigated two other complaints about how the Council decides eligibility for disabled parking badges, and we have found very similar faults with the Council in both cases. Because of this, I have considered whether it is necessary to make further recommendations to address what appear to be systemic issues.
37. I note that the Council agreed to check a random sample of case files each month to ensure it was keeping adequate records of assessments. However, it only agreed to do this on 17 October 2018 – a day before Mr B’s assessment.
38. I would not expect this action to have led to an improvement after only a day. As a result, I will allow the Council the opportunity to identify issues with assessment forms as part of its monthly sampling, and will not recommend that it take further remedial action on this point.

Agreed action

39. The Council has agreed to arrange a new mobility assessment of Mr B, with a different assessor. The Council has agreed to ensure it considers medical evidence, records proper details of its assessment on the form, and gives Mr B detailed reasons for its decision.
40. This action should be completed within six weeks of the date of this decision statement.

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Final decision

41. The Council was at fault. It failed to fully show how it made its decision on Mr B’s disabled parking badge application, and failed to show that it had properly considered his medical evidence. The agreed action remedies Mr B’s injustice.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman