Summary: The Ombudsman will not investigate Mr B’s complaint about past and future Council road traffic schemes. This is because Council traffic schemes affect all or most of the residents in the Council’s area and so the complaint falls outside our jurisdiction.

The complaint

1. The complainant, who I refer to as Mr B, says the Council has made mistakes with its past traffic schemes and it will repeat the same mistakes in planning future schemes. He is particularly concerned about the use of road traffic signals and says the problems he has identified affect all road users.

Back to top

The Ombudsman’s role and powers

2. We cannot investigate something that affects all or most of the people in a council’s area. (Local Government Act 1974, section 26(7), as amended)
3. We cannot investigate late complaints unless we decide there are good reasons. Late complaints are when someone takes more than 12 months to complain to us about something a council has done. (Local Government Act 1974, sections 26B and 34D, as amended)
4. We investigate complaints of injustice caused by ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’. I have used the word ‘fault’ to refer to these. We cannot question whether a council’s decision is right or wrong simply because the complainant disagrees with it. We must consider whether there was fault in the way the decision was reached. (Local Government Act 1974, section 34(3), as amended)
5. 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)

Back to top

How I considered this complaint

6. In considering the complaint I reviewed the information provided by Mr B and the Council. I gave Mr B the opportunity to comment on my draft decision and considered what he said.

Back to top

What I found

7. In 2017 Mr B contacted the Council about matters relating to road traffic schemes in its area.
8. In 2019 he contacted the Council again about similar matters, highlighting road traffic signals in his area which he disputed were the most effective solution the Council could have used in resolving traffic issues.
9. The Council gave a detailed response to Mr B but he is dissatisfied with it as he does not consider it has properly addressed the issues he has raised.

Assessment

10. The Local Government Act 1974 sets out our powers but also imposes restrictions on what we can investigate.
11. The restriction highlighted at paragraph 2 applies to Mr B’s complaint. I cannot see that he suffers some injustice which would not affect all or most of residents in the Council’s area and so the complaint falls outside our jurisdiction. In addition, past events from Mr B’s earlier complaint in 2017 are caught by the time restriction highlighted at paragraph 3 and also fall outside our jurisdiction to investigate.
12. The role of the Ombudsman is to consider complaints of injustice caused to the complainant as a result of fault by the local authority. We cannot review the merits of decisions properly taken and we cannot substitute our decisions with those taken by the authority.
13. Mr B says that what he has sought is the rationale behind and an explanation as to the best use of public funding on the projects with which he disagrees. However, public funding issues again affect “all or most” as he and all other taxpayers contribute to the public funding.

Back to top

Final decision

14. The Ombudsman cannot investigate this complaint. This is because the matters raised affect all or most of the residents in the Council’s area and so the complaint falls outside our jurisdiction.

Back to top

Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman