Summary: The Ombudsman will not investigate Mr X’s complaint as he is unlikely to find fault in the way the Council dealt with his complaint that two councillors breached the code of conduct.

The complaint

1. Mr X complains the Council has refused to carry out a formal investigation into his complaint that 2 councillors breached the Council’s code of conduct

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

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How I considered this complaint

3. I considered the information provided by Mr X including the Council’s response to his complaint. I also considered information about code of conduct complaints on the Council’s website.
4. Mr X had the opportunity to comment on the draft version of this decision.

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What I found

5. Mr X complained to the Council that 2 councillors breached the code by treating him with disrespect. He says the councillors would not speak with him at their surgeries. And they did not engage or show an interest in petitions raised concerning their ward, failed to return his phone call and failed to respond to a letter.
6. The Council’s arrangements for dealing with member complaints says:

“The Executive Director Core Services as Monitoring Officer should initially consider any complaint received and determine whether the complaint warrants any specific consideration by members. This will allow trivial or vexatious complaints to be filtered out at an early stage.”

7. Mr X’s complaint is dated October, but the Council did not receive it until November. Unfortunately, because of problems with its internal mail the letter did not arrive with the correct department until some weeks later.
8. The Council responded to Mr X in January. It apologised for the delay in its reply. The Executive Director Core Services considered his complaint. He decided that a failure of ward members to engage with Mr X is not a breach of the code. He explained that there is no duty for councillors to engage with constituents.

“ An elected Councillor has a role to represent the broad interests of their constituents but they are not a necessary, or the only channel of communication through which a constituent can raise their own individual concerns with regard to the services provided by or the functions of the Council. Those can be raised with the relevant service or they can be raised through the customer services team.”

Assessment

9. The Executive Director Core Services considered Mr X’s complaint before decided there was no breach of the code. This is the correct procedure and the Council is entitled to make this decision. The Ombudsman cannot question whether a council’s decision is right or wrong because the complainant disagrees with it. He must consider whether there was fault in the way the decision was reached.

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Final decision

10. I will not investigate this complaint. We are unlikely to find fault in the way the Council considered Mr X’s complaint and made its decision.

Investigator’s decision on behalf of the Ombudsman

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman