Summary: The Ombudsman will not investigate this complaint about the Council failing to properly consider a code of conduct complaint against a town councillor. This is because the personal injustice arising from the alleged fault by the Council is not significant enough to justify the Ombudsman’s continued involvement.

The complaint

1. The complainant, whom I refer to as Mr B, has concerns about the transparency, impartiality and scrutiny exercised by the Council when considering his code of conduct complaint about a town councillor’s use of a charitable organisation’s social media. In summary, Mr B says:
• It isn’t clear which Code of Conduct the Council has assessed his complaint against;
• The Council has ignored his evidence that the Member was acting in his capacity as a councillor at the time of the alleged code breaches;
• The Council was wrong to say his complaint was “tit-for-tat”, as he was unaware the councillor had made any complaints about him;
• The Council has refused to provide details of the Independent Person’s view on his complaint;
• The Council’s Standards Committee should have been involved in the assessment of his complaint.

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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’.
3. 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)
4. So, the Ombudsman does not offer a right of appeal against a council’s decision on complaints that a councillor has breached the code of conduct. But we can consider if there was fault in the way the monitoring officer or standards committee considered the complaint.
5. Finally, 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:

• the alleged fault has not caused injustice to the person who complained, or
• the injustice is not significant enough to justify our involvement.

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

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How I considered this complaint

6. I have considered:
• The original complaint and supporting documents Mr B sent to the Ombudsman;
• Mr B’s three responses to my request for further information about how he was affected by the Council’s decision on the complaint;
• The Council’s ‘Arrangements for dealing with standards allegations’
• Chapter 7, Part 2 of the Council’s Constitution
• The Town Council’s Code of Conduct;
• Mr B’s comments on a draft version of this statement.

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What I found

7. With reference to paragraph 5 above, even if there was fault in the way the District Council assessed the code of conduct complaint, the Ombudsman must also consider how this has impacted on Mr B.
8. I appreciate Mr B disputes the contents of the Council’s assessment/decision notice, and is disappointed the Council decided not to pursue his complaint against the councillor. But its decision has not, in my view, directly caused Mr B a significant and tangible personal injustice which would warrant the Ombudsman starting an investigation into the alleged faults.

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Final decision

9. The Ombudsman will not investigate Mr B’s complaint. This is because the alleged fault by the Council has not caused Mr B a significant personal injustice.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman