Summary: We will not investigate this complaint about the authority’s grant funding of several councils for use in improved traffic management schemes. There is insufficient evidence of any fault or significant injustice caused to Mr X which would warrant an investigation.

The complaint

1. Mr X complained about the authority providing funding to councils, including his own local authority, for replacement of existing traffic management systems. He believes the systems utilise potentially harmful technology and no public consultation was carried out about these concerns.

Back to top

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
• further investigation would not lead to a different outcome.

(Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended, section 34(B))

Back to top

How I considered this complaint

3. I considered information provided by the complainant and the Authority’s response.
4. I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

Back to top

My assessment

5. Mr X says the Authority provided grant funding to his and other councils which used it to introduce traffic management systems which he is opposed to. He says the body is complicit in the introduction of these systems because it provided government funding. He has made a separate complaint to us about his own council’s installation of these systems reference number 24022491.
6. The Authority told Mr X that it is a body which acts as a conduit for government grant funding and that it has no involvement in the installation or operation of the traffic signals infrastructure, which is the responsibility of the highway authority for each local authority.
7. I can see no reasons why Mr X should believe that this body had any responsibility for the traffic systems he is concerned about any more than central government which provided the funds for it to distribute. Any consultation on highways matters is for the highway authority itself. Many actions by highway authorities are carried out under statutory powers which often do not require public consultation or have any means of appeal by the general public.
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.

Back to top

Final decision

9. We will not investigate this complaint about the authority’s grant funding of several councils for use in improved traffic management schemes. There is insufficient evidence of any fault or significant injustice caused to Mr X which would warrant an investigation.

Back to top

Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman