Summary: We will not investigate this complaint about the Council’s proposed introduction of a new bus scheme in its area. There is insufficient evidence of fault causing injustice which would warrant an investigation.

The complaint

1. Mr X complained about the Council’s proposed introduction of a new bus contraflow scheme in his area. He says the scheme will be unsafe for him and other pedestrians in the area and that it was not properly conceived, audited for safety and considered as value for money.

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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.

(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.
4. I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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My assessment

5. Mr X says a new bus scheme has not been properly considered by the Council. He says the project management t, safety audit and budgetary concerns do not meet his understanding of the requirements and that it should have used external consultants to decide the scheme.
6. The Council says there is no requirement for it to use consultants and that the scheme was properly considered as an in-house project by competent officers. The part of the scheme which Mr X complained about being left out was done so for budgetary and feasibility reasons. The scheme was subject to two Traffic Regulation Orders (TRO) under the Road Traffic Regulation Act 1984 and notification and consultation followed that procedure. The consultation period ended in June 2024 and Mr X was able to make his objections clear in that period.
7. The TRO process requires a highway authority to have regard to any objections and to write to the objectors. It is not a referendum and the highway authority must decide whether or not to implement a scheme, usually at cabinet member level. In this case the Council has decided to implement the scheme and the formal order of making will give any objectors a further right to appeal to the High Court once it is published as made.
8. 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. Instead, we look at the processes an organisation followed to make its decision. If we consider it followed those processes correctly, we cannot question whether the decision was right or wrong, regardless of whether someone disagrees with the decision the organisation made.
9. There is no evidence that the Council has failed to follow the correct procedure for introducing the TRO proposals so far.

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Final decision

10. We will not investigate this complaint about the Council’s proposed introduction of a new bus scheme in its area. There is insufficient evidence of fault causing injustice which would warrant an investigation.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman