Summary: We will not investigate Mr B’s complaint about the Council’s handling of his neighbour’s planning application. There is not enough evidence of fault by the Council or of Mr B suffering a significant personal injustice to warrant our involvement.

The complaint

1. Mr B says a planning application for development next door contained serious errors so the Council should have rejected it. Mr B further complains the Council did not consult him or his neighbour on the application.
   He says the planning officer did not visit his property or respond to his letter detailing his concerns about the application. He also disagrees with the planning officers report assessing the proposed development, especially about its impact on residential amenity. Lastly, Mr B says a planning committee should consider the planning application.

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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:

• there is not enough evidence of fault to justify investigating, or
• 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))

3. We can consider whether there was fault in the way an organisation made its decision. If there was no fault in how the organisation made its decision, we cannot question the outcome. (Local Government Act 1974, section 34(3), as amended)

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How I considered this complaint

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

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My assessment

6. A planning application only needs to be accurate and detailed enough to allow the Council to know what developed it proposes and where. There is no evidence the application or plans are so wrong in any material respect the Council did not know what was proposed. Councils may and often do allow changes to applications or drawings. In this case the Council re-advertised the proposals, so Mr B and others had chance to comment. Although Mr B says the Council did not consult neighbours he was clearly able to comment so there is no injustice to him.
7. Mr B says the Council allowed new windows to be removed from the application and treated as ‘permitted development’ which did not need separate planning permission. There is no evidence the proposed windows would not be permitted development so the Council was not at fault for describing them thus. The applicant or owner could install the windows regardless of their planning application.
8. Mr B also says the rear extension was the subject of a separate Lawful Development Certificate Application. This did not, however, stop the Council from separately considering a planning application for it. The application is of a different type and different considerations apply. Mr B was aware of the planning application and had chance to object so he has not suffered any personal injustice from the way the Council considered different applications.
9. Mr B is unhappy the Certificate of Ownership showed the wrong date the applicants became owners of the property. The error was not the Council’s and when it became aware it sought a new certificate before it re-advertised the amended proposals. There is no fault in the Council’s actions.
10. The final concern Mr B raises is the applicant has claimed a strip of Mr B’s land as his own within the application. Legal rights and duties over land are a private civil matter, not a material planning matter the Council could consider.

Communication between the Council and Mr B

11. Mr B says the Council consulted neither him nor his neighbour on the planning application. Both were aware of the application, however, and could comment on it. Mr B has not therefore suffered significant injustice because of any lack of consultation.
12. Mr B also says the planning officer did not respond to some of his letter of objection. The law does not allow third parties to do more than comment on planning applications, nor require Councils to respond to or discuss comments people make, and there was no fault in the Council not doing so on this occasion.
13. Mr B considers a planning committee should decide the application, so Mr B and his neighbour have the chance to air their objections. Mr B has already had chance to object as part of the application process. The Council has also told him its scheme of delegation would require at least six objectors for a planning committee to have to consider the application. There is not enough evidence of fault in the way the Council decided the application to warrant us investigating it.

Planning Officer’s report

14. Mr B complains the planning officer has not visited his property as part of the process. It is for the planning officer to decide what visits they need to gather the relevant evidence to assess the application and recommend a decision. It is not fault for an officer not to visit a neighbour.
15. Mr B also disagrees with the planning officer’s report especially about their comments on the effect of the development on neighbouring properties’ residential amenity. But the Ombudsman is not an appeal body. This means we do not take a second look at a decision to decide if it was wrong. Instead, we look at the procedure an organisation followed to make its decision. If we see no evidence of fault in the way it made a decision, we cannot question whether the decision was right or wrong, regardless of whether Mr B disagrees with the result.
16. The planning officer’s report considers:
• Impact on the properties and character of the area
• Impact on residential amenity including whether it is overbearing, overshadowing, or overlooking
• Concerns raised by Mr B about noise and light impact and the accuracy of the application
• Relevant planning policies
17. A planning officer report should set out the proposal, material planning considerations, and the officer assessment of the application. That means reaching a professional view, not merely setting out facts. That Mr B disagrees with the conclusions the officer reached is not evidence of fault we need to investigate.

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Final decision

18. We will not investigate Mr B’s complaint because there is not enough evidence of fault by the Council affecting its decision, or that Mr B has suffered a significant personal injustice.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman