Summary: We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint about the Council not installing a crossing at a local road junction, and its processes and responses as the highways consultee on development applications decided by the local planning authority. There is not enough evidence of fault in the Council’s processes to warrant an investigation. The matters complained of cause insufficient significant personal injustice to Mr X or his organisation to justify us investigating. We also cannot achieve the outcomes sought.

The complaint

1. Mr X is part of an organisation dealing with local issues. He complains the Council:
1. has failed to take action regarding highway safety problems at a a local road junction;
2. has used smaller roads to relieve traffic pressures on an A-road, to be used as capacity for new housing developments;
3. did flawed traffic modelling as part of a planning application for a housing development application.
2. Mr X says there is a serious safety issue at the location currently without a crossing. He wants a safe crossing installed there. Mr X also wants an independent expert to review the traffic modelling performed by the Council when acting as the highways consultee on planning applications.

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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
• any fault has not caused injustice to the person who complained; or
• any injustice is not significant enough to justify our involvement; or
• we cannot achieve the outcome someone wants.

(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 from Mr X and the Council, and the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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My assessment

6. We are not an appeal body. We may only criticise a council’s decision where there is evidence of fault in its decision-making process and but for that fault officers would have made a different decision. So we consider the processes councils have followed to make their decisions. We cannot replace a council’s decision with our own or someone else’s opinion if the decision was reached after following proper process.
7. The Council was not the decision-maker on any of the planning applications for developments involved here. Mr X’s complaint is about the Council’s role as the highways consultee on planning applications managed and determined by a different body, the local planning authority.
8. In response to Mr X’s and his organisation’s concerns, the Council set out its position on each matter raised. Officers explained that, after assessment of the layout and traffic at the location where Mr X wants a crossing, it is their professional judgement a crossing is not achievable or desirable there. Officers explained how use of other roads by traffic serving as access to the new developments was acceptable. They assessed the capacity of the roads which may take more traffic due to the new developments when reaching their professional judgement and giving their consultee response. The Council’s officers explained how it did its traffic modelling and the reasons why they chose that process. In giving its consultee comments, officers took account of recent decisions by the Planning Inspectorate on what amounts to a ‘severe’ traffic impact caused by a development. The assessed impact on the traffic did not amount to such an impact so officers decided the measured traffic impact did not give them grounds to oppose the application in their comments.
9. There is not enough evidence of fault by the Council in the matters complained of to warrant investigation. Officers have followed their processes when giving the Council’s highways consultee responses and made judgements they were entitled to make. We recognise Mr X and his organisation disagree with the Council’s views. But it is not fault for a council to properly reach a view with which someone disagrees.
10. Even if there has been Council fault, we will not investigate here. Mr X’s complaint is made from his position as a member of a local organisation. The complaint issues raised are part of wider community campaigning relating to changes to the area from developments. These are campaign issues, better addressed to local councillors or MPs, rather than as a complaint to this office. The campaigning basis of Mr X’s complaint means there is insufficient significant injustice to him or his organisation as the complainants that we can identify here. Any incidents at the location where Mr X and his organisation would like to see a crossing would not be an injustice to them. That there is not a crossing in that location is insufficiently significant injustice to them to warrant investigation. Similarly, the more general traffic issues, about the use of different roads by vehicles which may be caused by new developments and how officers assess traffic as highways consultees, do not directly cause significant injustices to Mr X and his organisation to justify us investigating, and we will not do so.
11. The outcomes Mr X wants from his complaint are a crossing installed at the road location considered unsafe, and a review of the Council’s traffic modelling process when acting as highways consultee on planning matters. We cannot order councils to make changes to their highway, even if we have received a complaint about a specific location. We also cannot conduct a review of its highways consultee processes, nor order a council to commission a review. It is for councils to determine which processes and tests to use when providing their comments to a planning authority. The way the public and other interested bodies can comment on the highways issue is through the relevant local planning authority’s consultation process, not directly with the highways consultee authority. That we cannot achieve the outcomes Mr X and his organisation seek here is a further reason why we will not investigate.

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Final decision

12. We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint because:
• there is not enough evidence of Council fault to warrant us investigating; and
• there is insufficient significant personal injustice to him, or the organisation with which he is involved, to justify us investigating; and
• we cannot achieve the outcomes he and his organisation seek.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman