Wakefield City Council (20 007 892)
Category : Planning > Enforcement
Decision : Closed after initial enquiries
Decision date : 03 Feb 2021
The Ombudsman's final decision:
Summary: Mr X complains about delays by the Council in a planning enforcement matter. We will not investigate this complaint because there is insufficient personal injustice to Mr X to warrant investigation.
The complaint
- Mr X complains about delays by the Council in a planning enforcement matter.
The Ombudsman’s role and powers
- 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, or
- the fault has not caused injustice to the person who complained, or
- the injustice is not significant enough to justify our involvement.
(Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended)
How I considered this complaint
- I have considered the comments of the complainant and the Council and the complainant has commented on the draft decision.
What I found
- Mr X says that there has been an unauthorised use of land near his village which the Council previously enforced by use of planning enforcement notices. He says that there has been no effective action by the Council since 2018.
- The Ombudsman will not investigate a complaint where there is no significant personal injustice caused to a complainant. In this case Mr X lives at least a mile away from the land in question. I do not consider that he is affected in any significant way by the use of the land (although I appreciate he is upset by the matter). However, in the absence of any significant personal injustice to Mr X we will not investigate this complaint.
- It is open to a neighbour personally affected to make a complaint should they so wish.
Final decision
- I do not intend to investigate this complaint because there is insufficient injustice to warrant investigation.
Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman