Summary: We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint about enforcement of conditions of a planning permission by the Council. Investigation would be unlikely to find enough personal injustice to Mr X to warrant our further involvement.

The complaint

1. Mr X says the Council has failed to enforce two conditions imposed by the Planning Inspector when giving permission for a traveller site. He says this has caused ongoing uncertainty over impacts, loss of confidence in the planning system, and time and trouble in pursuing the matter.

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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 or continue an investigation if we decide:

• 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), as amended, section 34(B))

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How I considered this complaint

3. I considered information provided by the complainant.
4. I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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My assessment

5. Mr X’s home is at a distance from the site. He is unlikely to be personally affected by matters relating to noise and ventilation of residents’ properties, or a list of individuals living there. He also told the Council in an email on 8 December 2025, “To be honest with you most [people living in the same place as Mr X] don’t hear or see them at all and I am unaware of any issues in the [place] as a result of them living there.” In that context, the injustice he claims is unlikely to be sufficient to warrant our further involvement.

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Final decision

6. We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint because there is not enough evidence of personal injustice to warrant our further involvement

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman