Summary: Mr X complained about how the Council licenced a residential park home and considered Fit and Proper Person nominations. We do not find fault with how the Council licenced the site or considered the nominations. The Council was at fault as its Fit and Proper Person register did not contain all relevant information, but this has now been corrected.

The complaint

1. Mr X complains the Council incorrectly allowed Company B to operate a residential park home (the site). Mr X also complains the Council wrongly accepted Fit and Proper Person (F&PP) nominations from Company B and its F&PP register did not meet legal standards. Mr X says that as a result, he and other residents were left without legal protection and were overcharged by Company B.

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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 significant injustice, or that could cause injustice to others in the future we may suggest a remedy. (Local Government Act 1974, sections 26(1) and 26A(1), as amended)
3. We consider whether there was fault in the way an organisation made its decision. If there was no fault in how the organisation made its decision, we cannot question the outcome. (Local Government Act 1974, section 34(3), as amended)
4. The law says we cannot normally investigate a complaint when someone has a right of appeal, reference or review to a tribunal about the same matter. However, we may decide to investigate if we consider it would be unreasonable to expect the person to use this right. (Local Government Act 1974, section 26(6)(a), as amended)
5. We cannot investigate late complaints unless we decide there are good reasons. Late complaints are when someone takes more than 12 months to complain to us about something a council has done. (Local Government Act 1974, sections 26B and 34D, as amended)
6. If we are satisfied with an organisation’s actions or proposed actions, we can complete our investigation and issue a decision statement. (Local Government Act 1974, section 30(1B) and 34H(1), as amended)

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What I have and have not investigated

7. We cannot usually investigate complaints about events that took place more than 12 months before they were raised with the Council. As Mr X first contacted the Ombudsman in May 2025, anything that took place before May 2024 would be considered late.
8. However, I have exercised discretion to investigate Mr X’s complaint from when he said the licensing issues started in 2017 as he would not have been aware of the alleged issues until recently. I have investigated up to the point Mr X brought his complaint to the Ombudsman in May 2025.
9. The site Mr X lives on is licenced by the Council. The Council is responsible for ensuring that site licence conditions are adhered to and for taking appropriate action to secure compliance as required.
10. Private contractual matters between Mr X and the licence holder, including pitch fees, utility fees/contracts, site rules and pitch agreements are civil matters. Concerns around these matters can be raised with the First Tier Tribunal Property Tribunal so I have not considered them as part of this investigation.

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How I considered this complaint

11. I considered evidence provided by Mr X and the Council as well as relevant law, policy and guidance.
12. Mr X and the Council had an opportunity to comment on my draft decision. I considered any comments before making a final decision.

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What I found

Relevant law and policy

13. Owners of residential park home sites in England require a licence from the local council to operate.
14. The Caravan Sites and Control of Development Act 1960 requires occupiers of land to gain a licence before using that land as a caravan site with the local council being the licensing authority.
15. The Mobile Homes Regulations 2020 prohibits the use of land as a residential mobile home site unless the local authority is satisfied that the owner or manager of the site is a fit and proper person to manage the site. The purpose of the fit and proper person test is to improve the standards of mobile home site management.
16. The Mobile Homes Regulations 2020 states the following information must be included on the fit and proper persons register:
• The name and business contact details of the person;
• The name and address of the relevant protected site to which the application relates;
• The status of the person;
• The date of the first and last day of the period for which the person’s inclusion in the register has effect;
• Whether any condition is attached to the person’s inclusion in the register; and
• Where any condition is attached, the number of conditions, the dates of the first and last date for which the conditions apply, and the date any condition is varied or satisfied.

What happened

17. I have summarised below some key events leading to Mr X’s complaint. While I have considered everything submitted, this is not intended to be a detailed account of what took place.
18. Company A was the registered owner of the site Mr X lives on. The Council issued a license to Company A in 2017. The managing director of Company A is also the managing director of Company B.
19. In September 2021, the managing director of Company A submitted an application for Mr Y to be added to the Council’s F&PP register so he could manage the site. This referred to Mr Y as being employed by Company B. The Council considered the application and wrote to Company A to confirm the application had been accepted.
20. In January 2024, Mr Z submitted risk assessments for the site to the Council. At this point the Council wrote to Company A to ask if it needed to update its F&PP register to reflect new management of the site.
21. The Council then received a new F&PP application for Mr Z. After reviewing this, the Council identified several inaccuracies.
22. The Council wrote to Mr Z to set out what amendments needed to be made to the application. It acknowledged there were also inaccuracies in the application for Mr Y from 2021 and apologised for not having realised this at the time. The Council asked that Mr Y’s original application be corrected and resubmitted, or Mr Y be removed from the F&PP register and Mr Z continue with a corrected application for himself.
23. The Council considered Mr Z’s application and approved it. Mr Y was removed from the F&PP register.
24. In November 2024 the Council was made aware Company A had applied for a voluntary strike-off with companies house. The Council wrote to the managing director of Company A to explain that should Company A cease to exist, the site licence would be void and the site would become unlicenced.
25. Company A’s solicitors then contacted the Council to explain it had paused strike-off action and asked for guidance on transferring the site licence to Company B. The Council is currently awaiting a transfer application form to assess this.
26. In response to our enquiries, the Council identified that its fit and proper persons register did not include the correspondence details for the fit and proper person. This has now been added.

Analysis

27. Where land is used as a residential mobile home site, there must be a valid licence held by someone who has a legal interest in the land. Company A was the registered owner of the land the mobile home park is on, and this is who the Council licenced to operate it. I do not find the Council at fault here.
28. The licence holder does not need to personally carry out the day-to-day management of the site and can appoint someone else to run it as long as they satisfy the Council they are a F&PP.
29. In September 2021, Mr Y applied to join the Council’s F&PP register and be responsible for the running of the site. I find no fault with the Council accepting this application for consideration. However, the application contained errors the Council did not pick up on at the time. This amounts to fault. However, the error was corrected promptly once the Council noticed it and Mr Y was removed from the F&PP register before Mr X was aware of the error, so I find any personal injustice to him to be minimal here. It is not for me to speculate on whether Mr Y would have been accepted onto the F&PP register had the errors been spotted at the time.
30. In January 2024 the Council received an application for Mr Z to join the Council’s F&PP register and take over management responsibilities for the site. The Council sought additional information and corrections to the application and I do not find fault with the process it followed to approve it.
31. Mr X has concerns that Company B was actually responsible for the running of the site and says it was listed on the F&PP applications. I have also seen evidence that the Council corresponded with Mr Z through his Company B email address. However, I have seen no reason to suggest the Council was wrong to accept F&PP applications for Mr Y and Mr Z. While I appreciate there may have been administrative faults, the injustice caused here would have been minor confusion.
32. From November 2024 the Council was aware that Company A had applied for a voluntary strike-off. It promptly engaged with Company A to set out what implications this would have for the site licence and it continued to operate as the licence holder, with an appointed manager, up to the end point of my investigation in May 2025. I do not find the Council at fault here.
33. Mr X has said the Council’s F&PP register does not meet legal standards. During the course of our investigation, the Council identified its register did not contain all the relevant information. This amounts to fault and would have caused uncertainty for Mr X, which is injustice. However, the Council has now amended its register to contain the correct information and I find this to be suitable action.

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Decision

34. I do not find fault with how the Council decided to approve Company A as licence holder, or how it decided on the F&PP applications. I find the Council at fault for not ensuring its F&PP register contained all the relevant information, but I find it has taken suitable steps to remedy this.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman