Summary: The Ombudsman will not investigate Mr X’s complaint about the Council’s installation of a bollard outside his house. This is because it is unlikely we would find fault by the Council.

The complaint

1. The complainant, Mr X, complains the Council installed a bollard on the pavement outside his house without warning. He says this has stopped him from having a skip on his drive to dispose of rubble.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

2. We investigate complaints about ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’. In this statement, I have used the word ‘fault’ to refer to these. We must also consider whether any fault has had an adverse impact on the person making the complaint. I refer to this as ‘injustice’. We provide a free service, but must use public money carefully. We may decide not to start or continue with an investigation if we believe:

• it is unlikely we would find fault, or
• the fault has not caused injustice to the person who complained, or
• the injustice is not significant enough to justify our involvement, or
• it is unlikely we could add to any previous investigation by the Council, or
• it is unlikely further investigation will lead to a different outcome, or
• we cannot achieve the outcome someone wants.

(Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended)

3. When considering complaints, if there is a conflict of evidence, we make findings based on the balance of probabilities. This means that we will weigh up the available relevant evidence and base our findings on what we think was more likely to have happened.

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How I considered this complaint

4. I reviewed Mr X’s complaint and the Council’s responses. I shared my draft decision with Mr X and considered his comments.

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What I found

5. The Council installed a bollard on the pavement outside Mr X’s house to stop him from driving over it to park on his drive. Mr X does not have a dropped kerb/vehicle crossover and the Councils says it is illegal to drive over the pavement and that doing so risks damaging the surface and services running underneath it.
6. Mr X complains the Council did not give him any warning before installing the bollard and says his wife has a disability which means she cannot walk very far. He acknowledges his parking area does not comply with the Council’s policy but he would like it to remove the bollard and consider installing a dropped kerb so that he may access it.
7. The Ombudsman will not investigate this complaint. The Council says it wrote to Mr X six weeks prior to installing the bollard to ask him to stop driving over the pavement. Mr X did not receive the letter and questions if the Council sent it. But the Council’s records show it sent the letter and we could not reasonably conclude otherwise. While I do not doubt that Mr X did not receive the letter there is not enough evidence to show this was the result of any fault by the Council.
8. If Mr X wants the Council to install a dropped kerb he would need to make an application. He is aware his parking area is not big enough to comply with the Council’s policy but if he believes there are good reasons for the Council to make an exception in his case he may set these out as part of his application. The Council is under no obligation to approve Mr X’s application but this would give him a formal decision. We cannot however say the Council should waive the cost of any application or that it should install a dropped kerb without charge.

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Final decision

9. The Ombudsman will not investigate this complaint. This is because it is unlikely we would find fault by the Council.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman