Summary: We will not investigate this complaint about the Council’s handling of the complainant’s code of conduct complaint against a councillor. There is insufficient evidence of fault in the way the Council considered the matter.

The complaint

1. Mr X complains the Council considered his code of conduct complaint against a councillor internally, rather than through an independent body, and decided not to investigate his concerns about the councillor’s use of social media.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

2. We can investigate 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. So, we do not start 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, or
• we cannot achieve the outcome someone wants, or
• there is no worthwhile outcome achievable by our investigation.

(Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended, section 34(B))

3. With regard to the first bullet point above, we can consider whether there was fault in the way an organisation made its decision. If there was no fault in how the organisation made its decision, we cannot question the outcome. (Local Government Act 1974, section 34(3), as amended)

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How I considered this complaint

4. I considered:
• the information provided by Mr X.
• the Council’s ‘Procedure for Member Code of Conduct Complaints’.
• the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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My assessment

5. I appreciate Mr X is unhappy about the process by which the Council considers code of conduct complaints, and its decision on his case.
6. But the Ombudsman is not an appeal body, and we do not tell Council’s how to operate their services. This means we do not take a second look at a decision to decide if it was wrong. Instead, we look at whether the Council has properly followed its processes to make its decision. If we consider it followed those processes correctly, we cannot question whether the decision was right or wrong, regardless of whether the complainant disagrees with the decision the Council made.
7. Local authorities have a duty to designate a Monitoring Officer to ensure the lawfulness and fairness of authority decision making. The Monitoring Officer must ensure the authority, its officers and members maintain the highest standards of conduct. Each council has different rules for dealing with complaints about code of conduct breaches, and it is for the authority to decide what arrangements to adopt. In general, however, the Monitoring Officer will initially assess complaints and decide whether it merits formal investigation. 
8. Here, the Council has followed its arrangements for determining code of conduct complaints. It has considered what Mr X said, and explained why the code of conduct was not deemed to be engaged in relation to the actions complained of, so no further action would be taken on the complaint. That was a professional judgement the Council was entitled to make.
9. As such, there is insufficient evidence of fault in the way the Council determined Mr X’s code of conduct complaint, so we will not start an investigation.

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Final decision

10. We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint because there is insufficient evidence of procedural fault in the way the Council reached its decision on the code of conduct complaint.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman