Summary: Mr and Mrs X complain about the Council’s actions in refusing to accept their evidence about why a single person’s discount should have been applied to their property. They say the Council left them no choice but to appeal to the Valuation Tribunal, which they then won. The Ombudsman has decided this complaint is outside our jurisdiction. The Valuation Tribunal has dealt with the substantive issue and the reasons for Mr and Mrs X’s complaint are directly related to it. We cannot investigate something already looked at by a court or tribunal, even it was unable to remedy all of the injustice caused to Mr and Mrs X.

The complaint

1. Mr and Mrs X complain about the Council’s actions in refusing to accept their evidence about why a single person’s discount should have been applied to their property. They say the Council left them no choice but to appeal to the Valuation Tribunal, which they then won. Mr and Mrs X believe the Council inferred they were lying, ignored the law and produced misleading evidence for the appeal hearing. They say they incurred costs in having to appeal which the Council is refusing to compensate them for.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

2. The Valuation Tribunal deals with appeals against decisions on council tax liability and council tax support or reduction.
3. The Local Government Act 1974 sets out our powers but also imposes restrictions on what we can investigate.
4. We cannot investigate a complaint if someone has appealed to a tribunal or a government minister or started court action about the matter. (Local Government Act 1974, section 26(6), as amended)

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How I considered this complaint

5. I read Mr and Mrs X’s submission to the Ombudsman. This included the reasons they brought this complaint and correspondence with the Council both before and after the Valuation Tribunal hearing. I also spoke with Mr X to discuss his complaint before proceeding.
6. I shared a copy of my draft decision with Mr and Mrs X and the Council and I invited them to comment on it.

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What I found

7. Mr and Mrs X were living in separate houses for a period between late 2016 and early 2017. The house Mr X was living in was within the Council’s area. Mr X asked the Council to apply a single person’s discount to his account for the period from September 2016 to March 2017. The Council refused and gave its reasons.
8. Mr and Mrs X complained to the Council and later the Ombudsman about that decision. We said in May 2017 their complaint was a matter the Valuation Tribunal could resolve and chose not to investigate.
9. Mr X says the Valuation Tribunal initially directed him back to the Council. He asked the Council to reconsider its decision but it stood by it. Mr X continued writing to the Council but its position did not change.
10. Mr and Mrs X appealed to the Valuation Tribunal. It issued its decision in October 2018 and upheld their appeal. As a result, it directed a single person’s discount should be retrospectively applied to the council tax account for the property Mr X had lived in.
11. Mr and Mrs X say the Valuation Tribunal found the Council had not applied the law correctly. They also believe the Council provided misleading evidence to the Valuation Tribunal, in how it explained contact an officer had with their letting agency.
12. Mr and Mrs X point out they incurred costs in putting together their appeal, which the Valuation Tribunal did not compensate them for, and found the process stressful. They say the Council did not reply to all of Mr X’s letters and are unhappy it essentially accused them of lying when it refused to accept their explanation of their circumstances.

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Analysis

13. Mr and Mrs X have already exercised their right to appeal to the Valuation Tribunal. They say this complaint is separate from that and its outcome. They suggest it relates to the Council’s decision-making process which eventually forced them to appeal and the consequences of it.
14. I do not agree the two issues can be separated. The law says the Ombudsman cannot investigate a complaint about a matter which has already been appealed to a court or tribunal. The Valuation Tribunal falls within that definition. The courts have decided this applies even if the tribunal in question could not remedy all the claimed injustice.
15. Mr X wants the Ombudsman to investigate what he considers to be fault in the Council’s investigation. But I consider the main issue here was the Council’s decision not to apply a single person’s discount to the property Mr X was living in. The actions involved in that – how the Council interpreted the law, the weight it put on difference pieces of evidence, the extent of its investigation and how it corresponded with Mr X – are all part of the same picture. They cannot be separated.
16. The remedy Parliament provided for this was to appeal to the Valuation Tribunal. If there was fault in the Council’s approach, it has now been resolved. I have concluded therefore the Ombudsman has no jurisdiction to investigate this complaint.

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Final decision

17. This complaint is outside the Ombudsman’s jurisdiction and so we cannot investigate it.

Investigator’s final decision on behalf of the Ombudsman

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman