Summary: We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint about the Council’s refusal of his dropped kerb application. This is because we could not add to the investigation that the Council carried out, and there is not enough evidence of fault in how the Council made its decision to warrant us investigating.

The complaint

1. Mr X complains the Council has based its rejection of his dropped kerb application on an out-of-date policy.
2. Mr X also says that he has not received the refusal notice from the Council, and he has provided a duplicate to him. Mr X says this is preventing him from seeking advice about challenging the Council’s decision at Judicial Review.

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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 could not add to any previous investigation by the organisation.

(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. When Mr X asked about the reasons for the Council’s refusal of his dropped kerb application, a Council officer provided justification citing its out-of-date vehicle crossover policy.
8. Mr X complained to the Council about this. The Council’s response recognised fault in citing an outdated policy, offered Mr X an apology for this, and explained its decision for refusing his dropped kerb application in line with its current vehicle crossover policy.
9. As the Council has acknowledged fault in how it communicated its decision, and offered an apology to Mr X, we could not add anything further to the investigation it has already carried out.
10. The Council’s vehicle crossover policy states that it would not usually vary an existing Traffic Management Order unless exceptional circumstances applied. In its view, there were no exceptional circumstances in Mr X’s application. It also said it could not be certain that an existing Traffic Management Order would be varied.
11. We are not an appeal body. Our role is not to ask whether an organisation could have done things better, or whether we agree or disagree with what it did. Instead, we look at whether there was fault in how it made its decision. If we decide there was no fault in how it did so, we cannot ask whether it should have made a particular decision or say it should have reached a different outcome.
12. Given the Council was following its policy, it is unlikely we would find fault in how it decided to reject Mr X’s application and therefore we will not investigate.

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Final decision

13. We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint because we could not add to the investigation the Council has already carried out, and there is not enough evidence of fault in how the Council made its decision to warrant us investigating.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman