Summary: The Ombudsman will not investigate Miss X’s complaint about the planning notification and decision process the Council followed when dealing with an application for her neighbour’s house extension. There is not enough evidence of fault by the Council to warrant an Ombudsman investigation. The Ombudsman will also not investigate a council’s complaint process in isolation from the core complaint issue.

The complaint

1. Miss X lives in a bungalow next door to a property whose owner applied for planning permission. They sought permission for a two-storey front extension to the existing house. Miss X complains the Council failed to:
1. notify her of the planning application;
2. properly consider the impact of the development on her property;
3. properly investigate her complaint.
2. Miss X says the Council’s failure to notify her of the application meant she lost her opportunity to object to it. She considers the development will have an unacceptable impact on her property, including loss of light, loss of a view and loss of the property’s market value.
3. Miss X wants the Council to change its notification policy so it is responsible for telling parties affected about planning applications, or to require the applicants to tell their neighbours about their application. She also wants the Council to change its complaint process, to require the officer dealing with the complaint to visit the affected property.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

4. We investigate complaints of injustice caused by ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’. I have used the word ‘fault’ to refer to these. We cannot question whether a council’s decision is right or wrong simply because the complainant disagrees with it. We must consider whether there was fault in the way the decision was reached. (Local Government Act 1974, section 34(3), as amended)
5. 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
• it is unlikely we could add to any previous investigation by the Council.

(Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended)

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How I considered this complaint

6. As part of my assessment I have:
• considered the complaint and the documents provided by Miss X;
• viewed relevant online planning documents and maps;
• issued a draft decision, inviting Miss X to reply.

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What I found

7. I have not seen enough evidence of fault by the Council in how it notified residents of the planning application in 2019. The Council placed a notice in the local press and put up a site notice in the street near the development site, fulfilling the notification role. I cannot say Miss X lost her opportunity to submit representations about the application due to Council fault.
8. The planning officer visited the proposed development site and viewed the plans, to reach their view that the extension would not cause significant harm to the living conditions of neighbouring properties or result in overlooking to adjoining properties. Officers took account of the design, scale, location and orientation of the development to make their assessment and decide to grant the permission. I have not seen enough fault in the Council’s consideration of the application to warrant an Ombudsman investigation.
9. The planning officer’s assessment accepts there may be some harm caused, but that it would not be sufficient to warrant a refusal of the application. That was a professional judgement decision they were entitled to take. We can only criticise a council’s professional judgement decision where the process followed to make that decision involved fault which would have resulted in a different outcome. I have not seen enough evidence of such Council fault to be able to go behind the officers’ planning decision here. I realise Miss X disagrees with the officers’ judgement and decision. But it is not fault for a council to properly make a decision with which someone disagrees.
10. Miss X considers the Council did not investigate her complaint properly because officer responses relied on the planning report, and no complaints officer visited her property. We will not look at a council’s complaints processes in isolation, when we do not intend to look at the core issue giving rise to the complaint. That limitation applies here so I will not investigate this part of Miss X’s complaint.

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Final decision

11. The Ombudsman will not investigate this complaint. This is because:
• there is not enough evidence of fault by the Council in its planning notification or decision processes to warrant an Ombudsman investigation;
• the Ombudsman will not investigate the Council’s internal complaints process in isolation when not investigating the core issue giving rise to the complaint.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman