Summary: We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint about the Council allowing a developer to remove a footpath, a grass verge and trees when building on a site on his road. Even if there has been fault by the Council, the matters complained of do not cause Mr X sufficient significant personal injustice to warrant an investigation.

The complaint

1. Mr X lives on a road where a piece of land has been redeveloped for housing. He complains the Council:
1. has allowed the developer to remove a public footpath when building the development;
2. failed to consult local residents about the path’s removal;
3. may have allowed the developer to build illegally on a publicly owned grass verge;
4. may have allowed the developer to illegally remove trees from the site.
2. Mr X says he can no longer use the public footpath to get from the part of the pavement set back from the roadway to the part in front of the new development which is next to the road. He says he has to use the driveway of a property and sometimes that is difficult because the owners park cars on it. Mr X says he can no longer enjoy the grass verge and trees, and has lost the benefit of the trees to the local environment.
3. Mr X wants the Council to reinstate the public footpath. He wants reassurance that the developers have not illegally built on the grass verge. If the development was illegal, he wants the Council to reinstate the verge and return it to public use. If the trees have been removed illegally, Mr X wants the Council to require the developer to plant new trees.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

4. 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

5. I considered information from Mr X, relevant online maps and street images, and the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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My assessment

6. The developer of the land has built on the grass verges, removed the trees from the site and built over the short length of footpath. The footpath and one part of the grass verge forms part of the driveway of one of the end houses. The rest of the verge is now part of the other properties’ front driveways.
7. The Council accepts the verge land and tree felling done by the developer were unauthorised. The Council has confirmed in January 2024 that it is in discussions with the developer on how the path will be reinstated.
8. Even if there has been Council fault here, we will not investigate. We recognise Mr X’s street scene has lost amenity from the loss of the grass verge and trees. But this is not such a significant injustice to him to justify investigation. Mr X lives several properties away from the site, so the amenity of his own property is not significantly affected by the loss of the trees. We also realise Mr X may be caused inconvenience from the loss of the path and may have been caused annoyance from not being consulted about this effect of the development. But the impact of the blocking of the path is a brief and minimal diversion of his route, and Mr X’s annoyance at the lack of consultation is not a significant injustice to him given the minimal impact of the change to the pavements. The route required pedestrians to pass over a property’s driveway, which could have been used for parked cars, even when the lost path was still in place. Its loss does not worsen that part of the route to an extent that the change causes Mr X a significant personal injustice. Taken as a whole, the impacts of the loss of the verge, trees and path, and lack of consultation, do not cause such a significant personal injustice to Mr X to justify us investigating.

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Final decision

9. We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint because even if there has been fault by the Council, the matters complained of do not cause him a sufficiently significant personal injustice to warrant us investigating.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman