Summary: We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint about the Council’s and its planning committee’s decision to grant permission for a residential development near his property. There is not enough evidence of fault in the planning process to warrant an investigation and we cannot achieve the outcomes Mr X wants.

The complaint

1. Mr X lives near a plot of land which received planning permission for a new residential property. He complains:
1. the Council’s planning committee dismissed the genuine fears and objections of local residents by granting the permission;
2. the Council rushed the matter and pre-determined it before the committee meeting.
2. Mr X wants the Council to overturn the planning decision and put a protection order on the land so it cannot be built on.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

3. We investigate complaints of injustice caused by ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’. I have used the word fault to refer to these. We 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)
4. 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
• we cannot achieve the outcome someone wants.

5. (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended, section 34(B))

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How I considered this complaint

6. I considered information from Mr X, relevant online planning documents and maps, and the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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My assessment

7. We are not an appeal body. We may only criticise a council or committee decision where there is evidence of fault in the decision-making processes and but for that fault officers or members would have made a different decision. So we consider the processes followed to make decisions. We cannot replace a council’s or committee’s decision with our own or someone else’s opinion if the decision has been reached after following proper process.
8. Mr X says the Council’s planning committee failed to consider the impacts on his and other’s property, and on the local area, which he considers would be caused by the new development. These impacts included loss of privacy to his property, flood risks, increased traffic and loss of birds and wildlife from the site.
9. Officers gathered relevant information about the development, its location and relationship with existing properties and applied the relevant policies, as set out in their planning report to the committee. They considered none of the objections raised by Mr X or others gave grounds to refuse the application. This was a view they were entitled to reach when recommending the development for approval by the committee. It was then for the committee to make the decision on whether to grant the permission. If the planning committee had not agreed with the officers’ recommendation, it was open to its members to defer their decision to get more information, or to go against the officers’ view. The committee members agreed with the officers and decided to grant the permission.
10. There is not enough evidence of fault in the Council officers’ or the committee’s decision-making processes here to allow us to go behind the decision or to warrant an investigation. There is also insufficient evidence to support the claim that the planning processes were in any way rushed or pre-determined by officers or the committee. Officers giving their planning recommendations in their report is part of the usual planning process; it is not evidence of pre-determination of the matter by the committee, which was the decision-maker here. The planning processes took proper account of the objections raised. We realise Mr X disagrees with the planning decision. But it is not fault for a council or its planning committee to properly make a decision with which someone disagrees.
11. The outcomes Mr X wants from his complaint is for the Council to reverse the planning decision and prevent any building on the site. This would require the Council revoking the granted permission. We cannot order councils to revoke planning permissions, nor order them to prevent development of a site. That we cannot achieve the outcomes Mr X seeks from his complaint is a further reason why we will not investigate.

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Final decision

12. We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint because:
• there is not enough evidence of fault in the planning process to warrant us investigating; and
• we cannot achieve the outcomes he seeks from his complaint.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman