Summary: Mr B complains the Council have not provided a refuse collection service properly. The Council is not at fault.

The complaint

1. The complainant, whom I shall refer to as Mr B, complains the Council has failed to deal properly with refuse collection because:
• It has stopped collecting refuse from his home and introduced alternative arrangements from a collection point some distance away;
• The alternative arrangements made are not adequate; and
• It has not taken action to deal with environmental problems caused by rats and seagulls.
2. Mr B says he has suffered inconvenience when disposing of his refuse, the collection area has been left in a poor condition and there has been an increase of rats and vermin as a result.

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What I have investigated

3. I have investigated that part of Mr B’s complaint about the adequacy of refuse collection arrangements and environmental problems. The final section of this statement contains my reasons for not investigating the rest of the complaint.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

4. 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 any injustice is not significant enough to justify our involvement. (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6))
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/care provider has done. (Local Government Act 1974, sections 26B and 34D, as amended)
6. 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

7. I spoke to Mr B about his complaint. I made enquiries of the Council and considered its response and the supporting documents it provided.
8. Mr B and the Council had an opportunity to comment on my draft decision. I considered any comments received before making a final decision.

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What I found

9. It shall be the duty of each waste collection authority to arrange for the collection of household waste in its area. (Environmental Protection Act 1990 s45(1)(a))

What happened?

10. In 2014, Council changed collection arrangements for Mr B’s home from individual properties to a communal collection point. The collection point is a small timber building about half a mile from Mr B’s home.
11. Mr B complained about the change in collection arrangements and environmental problems caused by the collection arrangements in August 2020. The Council said it planned to replace the existing bin store with a hard standing compound with lidded bin for nearby resident’s use only, but did not have a timescale for this.
12. Mr B informed the Council the land on which the collection point was situated belonged to someone else. The Council investigated who owned the land. It found the land was unregistered and said it would try to obtain a licence from the owner to use the site.
13. Mr B remained unhappy about the Council’s decision to change the collection arrangements and the problems with the condition of the collection point.

Analysis

Current refuse collection arrangements

14. The Council’s proposals are improvements to existing arrangements, not major changes to the arrangements themselves. The Council says it is happy with the site but needs to upgrade the facilities there.
15. There has been a delay to the implementation of the improvements. This is due to complications about the land ownership. The Council says it has identified the owner, but the land has been leased to someone else. It says the leaseholder is happy for the waste storage area to remain at its present location.
16. The Council is providing a household waste collection service, even if Mr B does not agree it is sufficient. It plans to upgrade the current collection point facilities and is in the process of resolving the legal issues over land ownership to enable this to take place. This is not fault by the Council.

Environmental problems

17. Photographs of the existing refuse collection point taken by Mr B show there has been some littering at times. These clearly illustrate why the Council has decided to upgrade the facilities.
18. Whilst not ideal, there is no evidence of any significant injustice caused to Mr B by this. I have therefore not investigated this aspect of Mr B’s complaint further.
19. Records provided by the Council show that Mr B has only made one report about rodent problems. I have seen evidence from the Council to show that its pest control service has attended the site on ten days in October 2020 and a further fourteen times between June and October 2021, to deal with the problems he reported.
20. Mr B says he has experienced problems with rats at their home, which is situated approximately half a mile away from the refuse collection point. There is no evidence to support a causal link between any reported problems at the refuse collection point and Mr B’s home. This is not fault by the Council.

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Final decision

21. I have not found fault by the Council. I have now completed my investigation

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Parts of the complaint that I did not investigate

22. I have not investigated Mr B’s complaint about the change of refuse collection arrangements in 2014 because Mr B has not complained about this issue until now to either the Council or the Ombudsman. This is a late complaint and I have seen no good reason to accept it for investigation now.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman