Summary: The Ombudsman will not investigate this complaint about the Council’s administration of an application for a Residents’ Blue Badge holders parking bay. This is because it is unlikely he would find fault by the Council in the way it administered the application, or that this has caused any injustice to the complainant.

The complaint

1. The complainant, who I shall refer to as Mr X, is unhappy about the Council’s process for his application for a Residents’ Blue Badge holders parking bay outside his house. He says the process is unnecessarily complicated and is discriminatory to him, as a person with a disability.

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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,
• the injustice is not significant enough to justify our involvement.

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

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How I considered this complaint

3. I read what Mr X has told us and the Council’s response to his complaint. I also read Mr X’s comments on a draft of this decision.

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What I found

What happened

4. Mr X successfully applied for a Blue Badge. He then looked at how to apply to the Council for a Blue Badge holders parking bay outside his house. He says this requires him to duplicate information already provided for his Blue Badge, making the process unnecessarily complicated, and discriminatory for him, as person with a disability. The Council should simplify the process and share the information held for his Blue Badge with the team dealing with parking bay applications.
5. Mr X complained to the Council about its process. In its response the Council said:

• Under the General Data Protection Regulations (GDPR) it is not allowed to collect personal data for one purpose and then use it for another without consent. And where the information concerns health, it is treated as sensitive and the consent must be explicit.
• It would share the Blue Badge criteria data internally if Mr X gave it explicit consent to do so. But as the parking bay application was a separate process it would still require him to provide the additional information not required as part of the Blue Badge application, including the declaration he would be required to make as part of the parking bay application.
• It was satisfied with its current administration of the Residents Blue Badge holders parking bay scheme and did not propose any further review at this time.

Assessment

6. The Council is not at fault in not sharing Mr X’s information internally without his explicit consent. It has explained it is not allowed to do this under the GDPR.
7. Mr X has not been prevented from making an application for a Blue Badge parking bay by a requirement to duplicate information. The Council has told him he can do this without duplicating information by giving his explicit consent for it to share information internally.
8. Mr X has told us he gave his verbal consent to the sharing of the information when he spoke to the Council in December 2019. He asked whether it would send him a consent form or needed a letter from him. He was told the Council would get back to him but he heard nothing further.
9. The Council sent its responses to the complaint on 10 and 20 December 2019. These set out the Council’s understanding that Mr X would not give his consent to the sharing of information. I have not seen anything to show Mr X contacted the Council again to correct any misunderstanding about this.
10. The Council has told us it will now send Mr X the relevant consent form. Once this is returned it will use the Blue Badge information for the parking bay application.
11. The Council requires information in addition to that held for the Blue Badge to assess applications under its Residents Blue Badge holders parking bay scheme. It is not at fault in asking Mr X to provide this additional information. Mr X has told us he understands this needs to be provided.
12. I appreciate Mr X is unhappy about the delay in getting to this point. But I do not consider there has been any fault by the Council, or any injustice caused to Mr X warranting investigation by us.

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Final decision

13. I will not investigate this complaint. This is because there is insufficient evidence of fault by the Council and insufficient evidence of injustice.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman