Summary: We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint about the Council’s bin collections and how officers responded to his complaint. There is not enough evidence of fault in the Council’s decision-making process on the collections’ timings to warrant investigation. We do not investigate councils’ complaint-handling in isolation when we are not investigating the core issue giving rise to the complaint. Investigation would not achieve a different outcome.

The complaint

1. Mr X complains the Council:
1. empties the bins for his street and a nearby school too early in the morning;
2. failed during its complaint process to respond to any of his alternative proposals for emptying the bins.
2. Mr X says the bin collections affect his sleep and health. He wants the Council to properly consider his proposals for the bin collections, including using a wheelie bin caddy with inflated tyres which he says would eliminate bin noise.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

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
• further investigation would not lead to a different outcome.

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

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How I considered this complaint

4. I considered information from Mr X, and the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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My assessment

5. The Council considered Mr X’s concerns about the early bin collections. Officers explained the reasons they cannot start the service later in the day in Mr X’s area. The timing needs to avoid the bin crews being caught up in traffic or doing the collections as people arrive at a nearby school. There is not enough evidence of fault by the Council in how it has reached its decision on the timing of the collections to warrant investigation.
6. In any event, Mr X does not say he is seeking any change to the collections’ timings. The outcome he wants is for the Council to properly consider the proposals on how to improve the collections he put to officers during its complaint process, which he says they ignored. It is unfortunate if the Council did not respond to Mr X’s suggestions when responding to his complaint. But we do not investigate councils’ complaint processes in isolation where we are not investigating the core issue which gave rise to the complaint. It is not a good use of our resources, gained from public funds, for us to do so. That limitation applies here so we will not pursue this part of the complaint
7. Even if the Council had not responded to Mr X’s suggestions outside its complaint process, we would not have investigated. I say this because we cannot order councils to use their resources in any particular way to provide their bin collection service. That is the responsibility of council officers whose professional role it is to design waste services. Investigation would not achieve a different outcome here.

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Final decision

8. We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint because:
• there is not enough evidence of fault in the Council’s decision-making to warrant investigation; and
• we do not investigate councils’ complaint-handling in isolation when we are not investigating the core issue giving rise to the complaint; and
• an investigation would not achieve a different outcome.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman