Summary: The Ombudsman will not investigate Mr X’s complaint about the Council’s Environmental Health Team. This is because the complaint is late and there is not enough evidence of fault causing injustice. It is unlikely we could add anything to the Council’s response.

The complaint

1. The complainant, whom I shall call Mr X, complains about the advice given to him by an Environmental Health Officer (EHO) in 2017, after Mr X reported potential bed bugs in his property to the Council. Mr X is also unhappy about the Council’s subsequent actions. Mr X says the Council’s actions left him worried and led to his landlord attempting to increase his rent and eventually evicting Mr X.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

2. The Local Government Act 1974 sets out our powers but also imposes restrictions on what we can investigate.
3. 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)
4. 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’. We provide a free service, but must use public money carefully. We may decide not to start or continue with an investigation if we believe:

• it is unlikely we would find fault, or
• the fault has not caused injustice to the person who complained, or
• the injustice is not significant enough to justify our involvement, or
• it is unlikely we could add to any previous investigation by the Council, or
• it is unlikely further investigation will lead to a different outcome. (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended)

5. We cannot question whether a council’s decision is right or wrong simply because the complainant disagrees with it. We must consider whether there was fault in the way the decision was reached. (Local Government Act 1974, section 34(3), as amended)

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How I considered this complaint

6. I considered Mr X’s complaint to the Ombudsman and the information he provided. I looked at information from the Council and gave Mr X the opportunity to comment on a draft statement before reaching a final decision on his complaint.

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What I found

What happened

7. Mr X has recently complained to the Council about his contact with an EHO and the Council’s subsequent actions after he reported a possible infestation of bed bugs in his private residence. The events took place in 2017. Mr X has explained to the Council why he has only just complained. I have summarised below some of the key points from Mr X’s complaint to the Council.
• An EHO visited Mr X’s property and took samples of insects from Mr X’s property and the neighbouring flat. Mr X says the EHO later confirmed they were bed bugs. The EHO said bed bugs can live for up to 18 months so treatment was vital.
• The Council told Mr X it would serve his landlord with a notice to carry out an inspection and work to clear the infestation.
• Mr X queried if both sets of insects collected were bed bugs - because he thought one looked more like a flea. The EHO said they were both bed bugs, but the samples had been destroyed.
• Because the Council had said it had identified bed bugs, it advised Mr X to place any clean washing into bin bags.
• The Council served a notice on Mr X’s landlord to arrange an assessment of the building and to treat the building as needed.
• Mr X says his landlord commissioned a report which said both flats needed to be treated – but the landlord did not arrange for this to happen. Mr X says he tried to contact the EHO, but she was away from the office.
• Mr X says the Council closed the case three months later. Only his neighbours’ property had been treated – but at the tenant’s expense. Mr X says no common areas were treated. Because of what the EHO originally said, Mr X was worried the property could be infested and the bed bugs might return. Mr X says “My peace of mind in my home was destroyed.”
• Mr X says the events above led to his landlord trying to increase his rent and eventually evicting Mr X.
• Mr X says that it was only in April 2019 he read the report from a pest control company commissioned by his landlord. The Council sent Mr X a copy of this report in 2017. Mr X says it wrongly said his property had been reassessed.
8. The Council responded to Mr X’s complaint in August 2019. It said it had served Mr X’s landlord with a Section 83 notice requiring a survey to carry out the “extent of the bed bug and flea infestation”. The Council said it wrote to Mr X to say it would wait for documentation from the landlord, and if there were no further complaints, the case would be closed. The Council says Mr X said on 01 November 2017, he had “no issue with bed bugs at the moment.”
9. The Council says it wrote to Mr X on 10 November 2017, with a copy of the landlord’s assessment. This said there was no evidence of bed bugs in Mr X’s flat. The Council said that if there was further evidence of pests that had an impact on public health, then the Council would ask that Mr X’s flat be treated. The Council wrote to Mr X in December 2017. It said there had been no further evidence of bed bugs and so the case would be closed.
10. The Council said it had served a notice on Mr X’s landlord and communicated with Mr X throughout the process. Mr X raised no further issues after the case was closed. It did not therefore uphold his complaint.
11. Mr X’s response to the Council in December 2019 included:
• The EHO saying the treatment was necessary severely affected his life – but no treatment was carried out. This left Mr X worried bed bugs might have invaded his possessions.
• It is irrelevant he did not raise further issues in 2017. Mr X said he made his dissatisfaction clear in emails sent in November and December 2017.
• The Council had misrepresented him by saying he had “no issues with bed bugs at the moment”. Not being bitten was not the same as understanding why the flat no longer needed to be treated.
12. The Council has said it will not consider Mr X’s complaint at the next stage of its process. This is because it would be unlikely to add anything to its original response, and a request for a review needed to be made within one month of the original decision. Mr X’s request was therefore late.

Assessment

13. The Ombudsman normally expects people to complain to us within twelve months of them becoming aware of a problem. We look at each complaint individually, and on its merits, considering the circumstances of each case. But we do not exercise discretion to accept a late complaint unless there are good reasons to do so. I do not consider that to be the case here. Mr X has put forward his reasons for not complaining earlier and they are clear. But it does not automatically follow we will investigate – and I do not consider an investigation into Mr X’s complaint to be appropriate. In reaching this decision, I have taken into account the points I make below.
14. The events at the heart of Mr X’s complaint took place more than two years ago. As time goes by, it becomes harder to investigate a complaint. Memories fade and staff move on. The EHO Mr X dealt with is away from work on a long-term basis. It would be difficult to now reach a safe conclusion about what happened and what was said in 2017.
15. Mr X is unhappy with the advice the EHO gave him about bed bugs and the worry this led to. But it is unlikely we would say it was fault for an EHO to warn a member of the public about such things – especially if they thought a property had a bed bug problem.
16. Mr X is unhappy the Council did not pursue the Section 83 notice. But this is a decision the Council was entitled to take. It took the decision based on the report commissioned by Mr X’s landlord and because there was no new evidence of bed bugs. On balance, I do not think there is enough evidence of fault in how the Council took this decision to warrant an investigation.
17. Any issues with information sent to the Council by Mr X’s landlord are the landlord’s responsibility. Issues in the report are not due to fault by the Council.
18. Mr X says the EHO’s and Council’s actions led to far greater worry about bed bugs. But this is something Mr X was already worried about – which is why he originally contacted the Council.
19. Mr X says the Council’s actions led to his landlord trying to increase his rent and eventually evicting him. But this is not something we could ever say with certainty. We would never be able to establish a strong enough causal link to make such a finding. An investigation by the Ombudsman is not therefore appropriate.

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Final decision

20. The Ombudsman will not investigate Mr X’s complaint. This is because the complaint is late and there is not enough evidence of fault causing injustice. It is unlikely we could add anything to the Council’s response.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman