Summary: We will not investigate this complaint about a fraud investigation. The conduct of two interviews did not cause significant enough injustice to warrant investigation. We are unlikely to find fault in the level of information Mrs X then had to give the Council. We are also unlikely to achieve what Mrs X wants in terms of compensation and waiving the business rates arrears. Mrs X can reasonably use her right to go to court about the alleged damage to her health.

The complaint

1. Mrs X complains about how the Council conducted a fraud investigation. She says this caused stress, put her to time and trouble finding evidence for the Council, and worsened her mental health problems.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

2. The law says we cannot normally investigate a complaint when someone could take the matter to court. However, we may decide to investigate if we consider it would be unreasonable to expect the person to go to court. (Local Government Act 1974, section 26(6)(c), as amended)
3. The Ombudsman investigates 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 may decide not to continue with 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, or we cannot achieve the outcome someone wants. (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6))
4. We consider whether there was fault in the way an organisation made its decision. If there was no fault in the decision making, we cannot question the outcome. (Local Government Act 1974, section 34(3), as amended)

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How I considered this complaint

5. I considered information provided by the complainant and copy correspondence from the Council.
6. I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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My assessment

7. Mrs X accepts she dishonestly gave the Council false information to avoid paying business rates. That resulted in an investigation about whether the business had received a grant fraudulently. The investigation decided the business had been entitled to the grant.
8. In the circumstances, there was no fault in the Council investigating whether fraud might have happened. Mrs X does not dispute the Council needed to investigate but complains about how the investigation was done.
9. In such situations, the Council must speak to people formally and under caution as part of possible a formal legal process. So there was no fault in the Council holding the first interview under caution.
10. Later, Mrs X sent the Council a further email seemingly contradicting what she had said in the interview about when the business had traded. The Council’s complaint responses to Mrs X gave reasons the Council judged this warranted further consideration, including another interview under caution, rather than dealing with this matter by email or a conversation as Mrs X suggested. That decision appears properly reached. So, while Mrs X can disagree with the Council’s reasons, I do not criticise the decision.
11. Mrs X is unhappy with the interviewing officer’s manner during both interviews, including repeatedly asking her if she was dishonest. Mrs X says she felt violated, attacked, patronised and demeaned. The Council denies any fault by the officer.
12. A fraud investigation will inevitably be uncomfortable. Someone who lies in an attempt to avoid paying business rates can legitimately expect a robust line of questioning about their actions and their honesty generally, even though such questions might be unwelcome and distressing. So an element of distress is unavoidable from a fraud investigation. There is a question about whether there might have been an extra, avoidable, distressing impact on Mrs X because of the officer’s allegedly improper manner and Mrs X’s mental health problems. However, even if any such extra impact happened, I do not consider it would be, in itself, significant enough to warrant the Ombudsman devoting time and public money to investigating whether the Council was at fault.
13. Mrs X states she had to spend considerable time getting evidence for the Council about when the business had been trading. She also says she had to answer other questions, seemingly irrelevant to her business, when she gave the Council that information. It is not the Council’s fault it took Mrs X so long to find evidence of trading in the relevant period. It was evidence the Council reasonably needed to satisfy it about the business’ eligibility for the grant. Some questions Mrs X had to answer when submitting that information might not have been directly relevant to this particular business. However, in the circumstances, it would not have been fault for the Council to ask about everything that might relate to eligibility for this type of grant. We would be unlikley to find fault on this point if we investigated.
14. Mrs X wants the Council to waive the business rates arrears (£2,663.18) and make her a payment. Even if there was good reason to investigate the complaint (and, as explained above, I do not consider there is) and even if we were to uphold the complaint, it is unlikely we would recommend this. The rates are undoubtedly owed. Recommending a financial remedy on that scale would be disproportionate. So it is unlikely we could achieve much of the personal remedy Mrs X wants.
15. Mrs X says the Council’s actions worsened her mental health and left her unable to work. She wants compensation. The Ombudsman does not give compensation in the way the courts might. Also, this point is essentially a personal injury claim, so the restriction in paragraph 2 applies. There might be some cost to court action but that, in itself, does not automatically mean the Ombudsman should investigate instead. The questions of whether personal injury occurred, and liability and compensation for it, are not straightforward legally. It is more appropriate for the courts than the Ombudsman to consider them. It would be reasonable for Mrs X to go to court for a decision on this point.

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Final decision

16. We will not investigate Mrs X’s complaint. The conduct of the interviews did not cause significant enough injustice to warrant investigation. We are unlikely to find fault in the level of information Mrs X then had to give the Council. We are also unlikely to achieve what Mrs X wants in terms of compensation and waiving the arrears. Mrs X can reasonably use her right to go to court about the alleged damage to her health.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman