Wakefield City Council (20 007 293)

Category : Environment and regulation > Drainage

Decision : Upheld

Decision date : 09 Apr 2021

The Ombudsman's final decision:

Summary: Mr X complained the Council failed to carry out work to Council owned drainage pipes from the highway which resulted in flooding to his property. The Council was at fault when it took too long to begin the work.

The complaint

  1. Mr X complained the Council has failed to carry out work to Council owned drainage pipes from the highway resulting in continued flooding to his property.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

  1. 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)
  2. 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

  1. I spoke to Mr X and considered his view of his complaint.
  2. I made enquiries of the Council and considered the information it provided.
  3. I wrote to Mr X and the Council with my draft decision and considered their comments before I made my final decision.

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What I found

  1. Mr X’s property experiences flooding to the cellar in periods of bad weather. He complained to the Council about this in November 2019 because he believed drainage pipes from the public highway were either the cause, or a contributory factor.
  2. The Council failed to take any action and so Mr X complained again in February 2020. The Council responded to Mr X in March and apologised for not responding to his original complaint. It said it would arrange in the near future to jet clean the connection pipe from the road gully and carry out investigations into the issues.
  3. The Council failed to take any further action and Mr X complained again in July 2020. In line with its complaints policy, the Council escalated Mr X’s complaint and responded in August. The Council officer who responded stated a Council engineer had carried out a recent site visit and discussed with Mr X measures it was taking to resolve the flooding to his property. The Council said it would arrange to have the connection pipe jet cleaned and would carry out an internal camera survey. It would then review the different options open to it before carrying out any required remedial work.
  4. Mr X heard nothing further, and so in October he complained to the Ombudsman. We informed the Council we would investigate.
  5. In November, the Council met with Mr X. It then emailed a contractor and asked it to carry out a site visit and advise on the best course of action.
  6. The contractor responded in January 2021 with the costs of carrying out the works. These commenced in March.

My findings

  1. The Council did not respond when Mr X initially complained. This is fault.
  2. When Mr X complained again in February 2020, although the Council responded in a timely manner, it did not carry out the investigative works to jet clean the pipe which it had agreed to do. This is fault. It took around a year from Mr X’s original complaint for the Council to do this work and then another four months to begin remedial work. This is a significant delay and is fault. As a result, Mr X was caused frustration and unnecessary time and trouble when he had to chase the Council.
  3. In relation to any damage to Mr X’s property caused by flooding, this is something we would not look to remedy as this is a matter best dealt with by his insurance company.

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Agreed actions

  1. Within one month of the date of the final decision the Council has agreed to apologise to Mr X for the delays in carrying out the drainage works and pay him £200 for the frustration and unnecessary time and trouble this caused him.

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Final decision

  1. There was fault leading to injustice. The Council has agreed to my recommendation. Therefore, I have completed my investigation.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman

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