Summary: We will not investigate this complaint about how the Council responded to Mr X’s complaint about the actions of two local councillors. This is because Mr X has not been caused an injustice as he has been able to raise his concerns about the Council’s actions through its corporate complaints process.

The complaint

1. Mr X complains the Council has refused to investigate his complaint that two local councillors failed to respond to him about a local issue. Mr X says the councillors should be disciplined.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

2. 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 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))

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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. The law only allows the Ombudsman to investigate the administrative functions of the Council. This means we cannot investigate the actions of the councillors as they were not fulfilling an administrative function of the Council at the time of the matter complained of.
6. We can consider complaints about how the Council applied its local arrangements for considering allegations that local councillors have failed to comply with its code of conduct.
7. The Council has said one councillor received an e-mail from Mr X and the other recalled speaking to him on the phone. The councillors said they took no further action because the issue was a matter for Council officers to deal with. Mr X had also raised a complaint with the Council about the matter.
8. We will not investigate this complaint as Mr X has not been caused an injustice as a result of the Council’s refusal to investigate his complaint. This is because Mr X has been able to raise the issues he is concerned about through the Council’s corporate complaints process.

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Final decision

9. We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint because he has not been caused an injustice as a result of the Council’s actions.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman