Summary: We will not investigate this complaint about personal comments made to Mr X by a member of Council staff. This is because there is insufficient evidence of fault by the Council or injustice caused to Mr X to warrant an investigation.

The complaint

1. The complainant, who I refer to as Mr X, says, due to a conflict of interest and inappropriate remarks made to him by a member of staff contracted to work at a Council office, the Council should stop using the worker and move them away from Council offices.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

2. 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 an investigation if we decide:

• there is not enough evidence of fault to justify investigating, or
• any injustice is not significant enough to justify our involvement, or
• we could not add to any previous investigation by the organisation, or
• further investigation would not lead to a different outcome, or
• we cannot achieve the outcome someone wants. (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6))

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How I considered this complaint

3. I considered information provided by Mr X, including the Council’s response to the complaint.
4. I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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My assessment

5. Mr X attended a Council office where a member of its contract staff, known personally to Mr X, made inappropriate personal comments to him.
6. In responding to Mr X’s complaint about the matter, the Council partially upheld his complaint because it accepted the member of staff should not have made comments based on personal rather than professional knowledge. It confirmed this was not behaviour it expected from its contract staff and that it had spoken to the contractor. It also apologised to Mr X.
7. We do not investigate every complaint we receive and, in this case, neither the fault nor the injustice are sufficient to warrant a formal investigation. Moreover, an investigation would be unlikely to add to the Council’s own investigation or lead to a different outcome.

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Final decision

8. We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint because there is insufficient evidence of fault by the Council or injustice caused to Mr X to warrant an investigation.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman