Summary: We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint about street cleaning. This is because there is insufficient evidence of fault by the Council and no significant injustice to Mr X to justify our involvement.

The complaint

1. Mr X complains the Council missed cleaning several streets and will not clean them again until the next scheduled date. He says the Council should increase the frequency of cleaning the streets and carry out inspections.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

2. 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.

(Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6))

3. It is not a good use of public resources to investigate complaints about complaint procedures, if we are unable to deal with the substantive issue.

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How I considered this complaint

4. I considered information provided by the complainant and the Council.
5. I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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My assessment

6. Mr X complains the Council missed cleaning several streets which it will not clean until the next schedule in 12 weeks.
7. Mr X reported the missed street cleaning to the Council and received an automated response. Mr X spoke later to an Officer of the Council and says they were dismissive to the issues raised.
8. Mr X says many trees in the area drop leaves on to the streets which are dangerous to pedestrians and look bad. He thinks the Council should clean the streets more often than once every 12 weeks.
9. The Council confirmed it inspected the area following Mr X’s complaint according to its policy and Officers found no reason to bring forward the cleaning schedule.
10. The Council explained it needs an automated service for reporting issues because of the large number of requests received.
11. The frequency of street cleaning is a decision made by Councillors. We cannot achieve the outcome Mr X wants.
12. The Council inspected the area following Mr X reporting the matter and found no reason to bring forward the cleaning schedule. There is insufficient evidence of fault to warrant an investigation and there is no significant injustice to Mr X.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman