East Hampshire District Council (21 018 422)
Category : Planning > Enforcement
Decision : Closed after initial enquiries
Decision date : 19 Apr 2022
The Ombudsman's final decision:
Summary: Mr X complains about the way the Council is considering three planning applications. We will not investigate this complaint because any injustice is speculative as the planning applications have not yet been determined.
The complaint
- Mr X complains about the way the Council is considering three planning applications.
The Ombudsman’s role and powers
- The Ombudsman investigates 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 may decide not to continue with an investigation if we decide:
- there is not enough evidence of fault to justify investigating, or
- any fault has not caused injustice to the person who complained, or
- any injustice is not significant enough to justify our involvement.
(Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6))
How I considered this complaint
- I considered information provided by the complainant and the Council.
- I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.
- The complainant had an opportunity to comment on my draft decision.
My assessment
- Mr X says that there has been administrative fault in the way the Council has considered three planning applications. He says that there was inaccurate information in the planning applications and the Council has acted in a biased way.
- None of the three planning applications have yet been determined. This means that any injustice from the Council’s consideration is speculative and insufficient grounds to enable the Ombudsman to investigate.
- If the Council grants planning permissions and Mr X believes he has suffered a direct injustice from the decisions he may make a further complaint to this office.
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