Derbyshire County Council (24 018 934)
Category : Transport and highways > Highway repair and maintenance
Decision : Closed after initial enquiries
Decision date : 26 Mar 2025
The Ombudsman's final decision:
Summary: We will not investigate this complaint about the Council’s replacement of speed limit signs, because any injustice is not significant enough to warrant our involvement.
The complaint
- Mr X complained about the Council’s replacement of speed limit signs, and how the Council handled his complaint.
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 fault has not caused injustice to the person who complained, 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 Mr X and the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.
My assessment
- Mr X says that there was a delay between the Council removing old 30mph speed limit signs, and replacing them with new ones. The Council has now installed the new signs and has explained the reasons for the delay. Mr X also says that one of the signs may be obscured by a bush in the future but this is uncertain; the owner or the Council may avoid that by maintaining it.
- We will not normally investigate a complaint unless there is good reason to believe that the complainant has suffered significant personal injustice as a direct result of the actions or inactions of the service provider. Although he may feel strongly about the issue, Mr X has not suffered a sufficiently serious injustice which warrants investigation.
- We will not investigate complaint handling when we are not investigating the subject of the complaint.
Final decision
- We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint because there is not enough evidence of significant injustice to warrant our involvement.
Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman