Summary: We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint about the Council’s decision not to provide him a resident’s parking permit. This is because we are unlikely to find fault. In any case we cannot achieve the outcome Mr X is seeking and there is therefore no worthwhile outcome achievable.

The complaint

1. Mr X said the Council acted unreasonably because it did not approve his application for a resident’s parking permit when he applied in 2024. Mr X said this was because there had been no change in his circumstances, and it had approved his application every year since 2019 on the same facts.
2. Mr X said this has caused him unnecessary inconvenience and he wants the Council to honour its original decision in 2019.

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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 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
• 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

5. I considered information provided by Mr X and the Council.
6. I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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My assessment

7. In 2019, Mr X complained to the Council, because it did not approve his request for a resident’s parking permit. It said it would not do so, because the motor vehicle he was applying for was not registered at the address he had applied for.
8. At the end of that complaint procedure, the Council agreed it would approve a parking permit for Mr X. It subsequently renewed Mr X’s request each year up until 2024.
9. When Mr X applied in 2024, the Council declined his request and provided him an explanation why. Mr X complained about the decision here, saying his circumstances had not changed and the Council’s decision was therefore unreasonable, given the earlier decisions it made. The Council responded to Mr X’s complaint. It said it could not see why it had agreed this in 2019, and did not uphold his complaint.
10. We will not investigate the Council’s decision in 2024, because it is unlikely we would find fault. The Ombudsman is not an appeal body. This means we do not take a second look at a decision to decide if it was wrong
11. In making its decision, the Council explained why it was following its policy and did not agree with Mr X as to how the policy could be interpreted, in so far as his complaint and his circumstances were concerned. I acknowledge Mr X will feel aggrieved the policy had been interpreted previously in his favour, but it is not fault a new decision maker disagreed.
12. Mr X was also unhappy with how the Council handled his complaint, but it is not a good use of public money to investigate complaint handling concerns, where we are not investigating the substantive issues.
13. In any case, Mr X wants us to make a ruling that is binding on the Council to agree his application in line with the 2019 decision, but for reasons I have set out at paragraph three and ten, we cannot achieve this outcome and therefore there would be no worthwhile outcome achievable by carrying out an investigation.

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Final decision

14. We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint, because it is unlikely we would find fault and there is no worthwhile outcome achievable by investigating.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman