Summary: We will not investigate this complaint about the Council’s handling of Mr A’s application on behalf of his mother, a blue badge holder, for a free residents parking permit. This is because there is insufficient evidence of fault by the Council to warrant an investigation and Mr A has been advised what is required to complete the application.

The complaint

1. Mr A complains about the Council’s handling of the application he made on behalf of his mother, a blue badge holder, for a free residents parking permit. He says as his mother’s carer, he has been discriminated against for requesting a free parking permit for a disabled blue badge holder and that the Council should issue the permit.

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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, or
• we could not add to any previous investigation by the organisation, or
• further investigation would not lead to a different outcome, or
• we cannot achieve the outcome someone wants, or
• there is no worthwhile outcome achievable by our investigation.

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

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How I considered this complaint

3. I considered information provided by the complainant and the Council, including its response to the complaint.
4. I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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My assessment

5. For a number of years Mr A’s mother has been a blue badge holder and has a disabled parking bay by her property.
6. This year, Mr A saw a Council leaflet which invited blue badge holders to apply for a residents parking permit free of charge so that they could park in any resident bay inside the controlled parking zone in which they live without the need to display their blue badges which are targeted by thieves.
7. Mr A contacted the Council about this, asking for assistance in applying for “the new free Disabled Bay Parking Permit which allows the resident to park in a disabled bay within the CPZ road without displaying their blue badge which are regularly stolen”.
8. The free blue badge residents parking permit is for parking in resident parking bays and not in disabled bays but because Mr A had made reference to parking in a disabled bay, the Council’s response to him included reference to applying for a disabled parking bay as well. It later apologised for this.
9. In responding to Mr A’s complaint about its handling of matters, the Council clarified that the criteria for a free blue badge residents parking permit means that the blue badge holder is required to be the registered keeper of the vehicle for which they are applying. However, it has told Mr A that as he is the registered keeper in this case, and not his mother, it would need evidence to show he is her carer to progress the application and has given him details of what evidence will be acceptable for this.
10. We do not investigate every complaint we receive and we will not investigate when there are insufficient grounds to do so. While matters appear to have been somewhat confused, the Council has explained what is required for a free blue badge residents parking permit and it is open to Mr A to provide the required evidence.
11. There was delay in the Council responding to Mr A’s complaint but we will not investigate complaint handling when we are not investigating the substantive issue.

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Final decision

12. We will not investigate Mr A’s complaint because there is insufficient evidence of fault by the Council to warrant an investigation and Mr A has been advised what is required to complete the application.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman