Summary: Mrs X complained about the Council’s failure to deal with her complaint about a councillor’s breach of its code of conduct. We found the Council had avoidably delayed dealing with the complaint and put Mrs X to avoidable time and trouble seeking a response which had caused her distress. The Council had since responded to the complaint and apologised for its delay. It also agreed our recommendation to make Mrs X a symbolic payment to properly address the remaining injustice caused by its faults. The Council also agreed to complete its review of its procedure for handling complaints about councillors and to update its website to improve peoples’ access to complaint information.

The complaint

1. Mrs X said the Council failed to deal with her complaint about a councillor’s conduct although she chased it for a response. And information about the complaint procedure was not accessible online as the Council’s website links did not work. Mrs X said the Council’s lack of action and transparency was frustrating and stressful and she felt ignored. Mrs X wanted the Council to apologise, deal with her complaint, and regularly check its website to ensure policies and procedures were available to residents.

Back to top

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’. If there has been fault which has caused significant injustice, or that could cause injustice to others in the future we may suggest a remedy. (Local Government Act 1974, sections 26(1) and 26A(1), as amended)
3. 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(1), as amended)

Back to top

How I considered this complaint

4. I considered evidence provided by Mrs X and the Council and relevant law, policy and guidance. I shared Council information with Mrs X. I also gave Mrs X and the Council an opportunity to comment on my draft decision and considered any comments received before making a final decision.

Back to top

What I found

Background

5. Councils must adopt a ‘code of conduct’ setting out the standards of behaviour, or conduct, expected of people when acting as councillors (see the Localism Act 2011, as amended). Councils must also have arrangements in place to investigate written allegations that a councillor has not complied with their council’s code.
6. Some councils must also appoint an officer as ‘Monitoring Officer’. Essentially, the Monitoring Officer’s role is to ensure their council’s decision making is lawful and fair. The Monitoring Officer is often responsible for handling complaints about councillors’ conduct under their council’s arrangements.

Summary of the Council’s arrangements for councillor conduct complaints

7. The Council’s procedure for handling complaints that councillors have breached the code of conduct (‘the Arrangements’) is available on its website. It includes an online complaints form that, when completed, is sent to the Council’s Monitoring Officer, who manages the Arrangements with support from other named people.
8. The councillor complained about is usually informed of the complaint. The Monitoring Officer then ‘filters’ complaints and may:

• decide no further action is needed;
• take steps short of formal investigation, for example, proposing mediation or arranging training; or
• refer the complaint for formal investigation.

9. Where the Monitoring Officer decides to take no further action, they must give written reasons for that decision to the complainant, the councillor, and the Chairman of the Council’s Standards and Ethics Committee (the Committee).
10. For a formal investigation, the Monitoring Officer appoints an Investigator to look into the complaint. The Investigator decides the procedure for the investigation. The Investigator issues a draft report on the investigation to the complainant and councillor, giving them 14 days to comment. A final report is then sent to the Committee, which decides the complaint, although the councillor has a right of appeal if found to have breached the code of conduct.

What happened

11. Mrs X made a complaint about a councillor’s (the Councillor) conduct. The Council confirmed receipt of the complaint. Hearing nothing further, Mrs X emailed the Council for information about three months later and it confirmed receipt of the email. Mrs X then searched the Council’s website for information and found it referred to the role of the Monitoring Officer. However, the website link for the complaints procedure was broken. Mrs X then telephoned the Council but did not succeed in getting information about the complaints procedure or in identifying the Monitoring Officer.
12. Mrs X then contacted us about her complaint. We contacted the Council, which told us it would respond to Mrs X’s complaint the following week but, it failed to do so. The Council also said its website link about complaints was working and it intended to review its councillor conduct complaint procedure. In the correspondence that followed, we found it best for the Council to first try to resolve and respond to Mrs X’s substantive complaint. We asked that Mrs X deal directly with the Council, although it was taking much longer than the 12 weeks we then normally considered sufficient to complete a complaints procedure.
13. After repeated chasers from Mrs X and over a year after she had made the complaint, the Council, apologising for its delay, responded. In summary, the Council said it had considered its code of conduct, spoken to the Councillor and read the correspondence between Mrs X and the Councillor. The Council also spoke to its senior officer that dealt with the issues of concern to Mrs X in her correspondence with the Councillor. The Council, while recognising Mrs X might not agree with the Councillor’s handling of her concerns, set out why it found no breach of its code of conduct. The Council confirmed it was reviewing its procedure for handling complaints about councillors and planned to provide more information about such complaints on its website.
14. About two months later, the Council’s Standards and Ethics Committee agreed that officers should review the Arrangements.

What the Council told us

15. The Council said the Arrangements did not include timescales. However, it accepted it took over a year to respond to Mrs X’s complaint. The Council said the time taken was due to the increasing number of complaints. And it was putting in place extra support for the Monitoring Officer to deal with complaints. The Council also accepted it had not kept in touch with Mrs X before responding to her complaint.
16. The Council repeated it was reviewing the Arrangements and had reported on proposed changes to the July 2025 meeting of the Committee. No other residents had reported problems accessing complaints information on its website. It intended to make the website more accessible, for example, adding an email link to the Monitoring Officer. The website already had monitoring software that automatically reported broken links. And officers responsible for information on the website reviewed it at least every six months.

Later events

17. The Committee further considered the Arrangements at its October and December 2025 meetings. The December 2025 meeting also considered the Government’s response to a national consultation about councillor standards and conduct. The Committee decided to update the Arrangements for existing complaints. The Council should approve the changes in January 2026. The Committee recognised the Arrangements would need further amendment once the Government acted on the response to the national consultation.

Consideration

18. We are not an appeal body and cannot consider the actions of councillors that have led to a code of conduct complaint. Our role is to consider whether councils have properly followed their procedures for handling such complaints to reach a decision. So, my investigation focused on whether there was evidence of fault in how the Council applied the Arrangements to Mrs X’s complaint.
19. The evidence indicated the Council’s ‘filter’ led to no further action. This was because, when the Council responded to the complaint, its letter to Mrs X set out why it found the Councillor had not breached the code of conduct. And there was no evidence any formal investigation, or action short of a formal investigation, had taken place. As the Council could filter out complaints without passing them for formal investigation (or other action), its letter to Mrs X was in line with the Arrangements. I therefore found no fault here.
20. However, there was no dispute it took the Council over a year to send the letter to Mrs X in response to her code of conduct complaint. The Council pointed out the Arrangements did not include any timescale for responding to complaints. However, without written timescales, councils must take a view on the time normally and reasonably needed to respond to complaints. Regardless of increasing complaint numbers, in taking over a year to respond to Mrs X, the Council failed to meet acceptable administrative standards. I therefore found fault here.
21. The evidence showed Mrs X had repeatedly tried to get a response from the Council throughout the year but without success. The Council accepted it had not kept in touch with Mrs X. But it provided no information to show it had considered either how to manage Mrs X’s expectations about timescales or the impact of such a lengthy wait. I found the Council failed to actively keep in touch with Mrs X and quickly explain and respond to service delays. This showed poor administrative practice and was fault.
22. The Council’s lack of proactive communication with Mrs X and the time taken to respond to her conduct complaint would likely have caused her distress. The evidence also showed Mrs X was put to avoidable time and trouble in chasing the Council for updates and information about her complaint. I therefore found the Council faults identified at paragraphs 20 and 21 caused Mrs X personal injustice.
23. Mrs X said she could not access information about the Arrangements and pointed to problems with the Council’s website. I had no reason to doubt what Mrs X said. However, the Council later confirmed its website link was working and, in writing this decision statement, I found that remained the case. The Council’s website and its links gave access to the Council’s councillor code of conduct, the Arrangements, and an online complaint form. In practice, problems arise with websites and some will be of limited effect and easily resolved and others more complex and time consuming to put right. Here, based on the evidence, I did not find fault by the Council on this point.
24. The Council had reviewed the Arrangements and aimed to approve changes in late January 2026. The changes included adding some timescales for processing complaints. The Council also intended to improve access to relevant complaint information on its website, including providing a contact email for the Monitoring Officer. The Council was also increasing officer support for the Monitoring Officer to help deal with increasing complaint numbers. I was satisfied the Council was addressing the wider issues raised by Mrs X’s complaint about access to complaint information and delays in complaint responses. However, given the time the Council had been reviewing the Arrangements, it should confirm implementation of the proposed changes.

Back to top

Action

25. Having found fault causing injustice, I considered our guidance on remedies. The Council had responded to Mrs X’s complaint and so no recommendations for completing the complaints procedure were needed. The Council had also apologised for its delay and the time and trouble this had caused Mrs X. However, I considered these actions had not proportionately, appropriately and reasonably addressed the injustice to Mrs X. So, the Council agreed (within 30 working days of this decision statement) to make a symbolic payment of £500 to Mrs X in recognition of the avoidable distress, time and trouble caused by its faults.
26. The Council also agreed (within three calendar months of this decision statement) to complete its review of the Arrangements for handling councillor code of conduct complaints. And then update its website to show the changes and provide a contact email for the Monitoring Officer to improve peoples’ access to information and transparency about the complaints procedure.
27. The Council agreed to send us evidence it had complied with the actions set out at paragraphs 25 and 26.

Back to top

Decision

28. I found fault causing injustice. The Council agreed actions to remedy injustice.

Back to top

Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman