Derby City Council (21 011 729)
Category : Other Categories > Councillor conduct and standards
Decision : Closed after initial enquiries
Decision date : 07 Dec 2021
The Ombudsman's final decision:
Summary: We will not investigate this complaint about the Council’s decision not to investigate Mr X’s complaint that three councillors have breached the Council’s Code of Conduct. We are unlikely to find fault in the way the Council considered the complaints.
The complaint
- The complainant, I shall call Mr X disagrees with the Council’s decisions not to investigate his reports that 3 councillors have breached the Code of Conduct.
The Ombudsman’s role and powers
- The Ombudsman investigates 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 may decide not to continue with an investigation if we decide there is not enough evidence of fault to justify investigating. (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6))
How I considered this complaint
- I considered information provided by Mr X, including the Council’s responses to his complaints and its procedure for dealing with complaints about councillors.
- I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.
My assessment
- Mr X disagrees with the Council’s decision on complaints he made alleging that 3 councillors breached the Code of Conduct. He says:
- 1 councillor made inaccurate statements in a meeting to ensure a vote went the way he wanted: and
- 2 councillors blocked him from their council social media pages
- We can investigate complaints about the Council failing to follow procedures in Code of Conduct investigations. However, we cannot look at the details of the complaint against councillors: that is for the Council not the Ombudsman.
- From the information I have seen the Council has followed its published procedures when considering Mr X’s complaints. Therefore, there is insufficient evidence of fault to justify an investigation.
Final decision
- We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint because we do not act as an appeals body, and we cannot consider the actions of the councillors. There is insufficient evidence of fault in the way the Council considered his complaints to justify an investigation.
Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman