Dacorum Borough Council (25 008 094)
The Ombudsman's final decision:
Summary: We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint about a planning officer working for the Council entering his home without permission. The remaining injustice is not significant enough to justify investigating.
The complaint
- Mr X complains a planning officer working for the Council entered his home without his permission.
The Ombudsman’s role and powers
- 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 injustice is not significant enough to justify our involvement.
(Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended, section 34(B))
How I considered this complaint
- I considered information provided by the complainant and I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.
My assessment
- One of the Council’s planning officers visited Mr X’s home for an initial inspection of a planning matter. Mr X was provided with no notice of the inspection, and he was not home at the time.
- Mr X complains the Council entered his property without his permission and without providing any notice. He says the Council officer had no right to enter his home and the contractor who was present didn’t speak English and could not give permission for the inspection.
- The Council say the contractor working in Mr X’s home gave permission for the officer to enter his home. They say that while the contractor did not speak English, the officer was able to communicate the purpose and scope of his inspection non-verbally.
- The Council have apologised to Mr X for entering his home without his permission. The Council have also said they will get permission from an owner/occupier before entering a property in the future.
Final decision
- We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint because the remaining injustice is not significant enough to justify investigating.
Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman