Bath and North East Somerset Council (25 025 823)
Category : Other Categories > Councillor conduct and standards
Decision : Closed after initial enquiries
Decision date : 30 Mar 2026
The Ombudsman's final decision:
Summary: We will not investigate how the Council dealt with a complaint about councillor conduct as any injustice arising from this is not sufficient to warrant our further involvement.
The complaint
- Complainant A is unhappy the Council decided not to investigate their complaint about a councillor’s comments about them which they found to be inappropriate and disrespectful. Complainant A is also unhappy about the councillor’s actions following the Council’s decision on their complaint.
The Ombudsman’s role and powers
- We 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. We do not start or continue an investigation if we decide any injustice is not significant enough to justify our involvement (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended, section 34(B))
How I considered this complaint
- I considered information provided by the complainant and the Council.
- I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.
My assessment
- I recognise Complainant A remains unhappy with the outcome of their complaint, but I do not consider that they are caused a level of injustice from the comments in question, or the Council’s response to the complaint to justify our further involvement, in the public interest. We have limited resources and must direct them to the most serious cases.
- We must allow a council a chance to respond to a complaint before we will assess it. Complainant A should therefore in the first instance complain to the Council about the councillor conduct following the Council’s decision.
Final decision
- We will not investigate Complainant A’s complaint because it does not give rise to a level of injustice that would warrant our further involvement. Any new conduct complaint must be made in the first instance to the Council.
Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman