Summary: We will not investigate this complaint about the way the Council considered the complainant’s complaint that a councillor had breached the code of conduct. There is not enough evidence of fault in the Council’s actions to justify investigating. Nor do we consider the complainant has suffered sufficient personal injustice to warrant our involvement.

The complaint

1. Mr X complains the Council failed to correctly enforce its rules on its Member’s Code of Conduct on councillors using Council resources for political purposes.
2. He says the Council’s actions question the transparency and trustworthiness of the Council.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

3. 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 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

4. I considered information provided by Mr X and information published on the Council’s website.
5. I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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My assessment

6. Local Authorities have a duty to designate a Monitoring Officer to ensure the lawfulness and fairness of authority decision making. The Monitoring Officer must ensure that the authority, its officers, and members maintain the highest standards of conduct. Each council has different rules for dealing with complaints about code of conduct breaches.
7. The Ombudsman does not provide an appeal against the Monitoring Officer’s decisions. We are also unable to investigate or comment on the actions of the councillor complained about. Where a decision has been made in line with the correct procedure, taking account of the relevant evidence, the Ombudsman will generally not criticise the decision, even if the complainant does not agree with it.
8. Mr X complained to the Council that two Councillors and a Parish Councillor had breached the code of conduct. From the information I have seen it appears the Deputy Monitoring Officer (DMO) decided not to take further action as if Mr X’s allegation was proved it would not amount to a breach of the Code of Conduct. The DMO confirms the Independent Person and Chair of the Standards Committee agreed with this view.

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Final decision

9. We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint because:
• there is insufficient evidence of fault in the way the Council considered his complaint; and
• we do not consider that Mr X has suffered a significant personal injustice.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman