Summary: Ms X complains about the Council’s failure to follow its wildlife and natural habitat policies in relation to a set of planning applications and permissions granted for housing development in her locale. We do not propose to investigate the complaint because Ms X has not suffered significant personal injustice.

The complaint

1. The complainant, who I refer to as Ms X, says the Council has failed to properly implement its policies when allowing planning permission for large housing developments in her locale without implementing mitigation measures to protect wildlife and the natural habitat. This has caused her to be depressed.

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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 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))

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How I considered this complaint

3. I considered information provided Ms X, including the Council’s response to her complaint.
4. I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.
5. I gave Ms X the opportunity to comment on my draft decision and considered what she said.

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My assessment

6. In deciding whether to investigate a complaint we must look not only at the claimed fault but also at the injustice caused to the complainant. We do not investigate every complaint we receive and we will not normally investigate a complaint unless there is good reason to believe the complainant has suffered significant personal injustice as a direct result of the actions or inactions of the body complained about.
7. Ms X says there is a clear link between the Council’s failings and the depression caused to her and others in the immediate area affected by the development. However, while I understand Ms X’s own strength of feeling about these matters, for our purposes her personal injustice is not at a level which warrants investigation of her complaint. We can consider issues relating to the wider public interest when deciding whether to investigate a complaint but the tests are not met here when we are more likely to investigate a complaint of significant public interest or a known issue of current concern to the Ombudsman.
8. In responding to my draft decision Ms X says her complaint should be investigated because the wider community is witnessing severe impacts upon the wildlife it values. However, we do not investigate every complaint we receive and it is for the Ombudsman to decide whether there are issues relating to the wider public interest which should be investigated, taking into account matters such as the level of public interest and whether there is a known issue of current concern to the Ombudsman.

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Final decision

9. We will not investigate this complaint. This is because Ms X has not suffered significant personal injustice.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman