Summary: We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint about the Council’s refusal to allocate him a disabled parking space at his workplace. This is because there is not enough evidence of fault by the Council and we cannot achieve the outcome Mr X wants.

The complaint

1. The complainant, Mr X, has a blue badge. He says the Council has discriminated against him by refusing to allow him to use disabled parking bays at his workplace.

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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 effect 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 an investigation if we decide the tests set out in our Assessment Code are not met. (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended)
3. The Local Government Act 1974 sets out our powers but also imposes restrictions on what we can investigate.
4. The law says we cannot normally investigate a complaint when someone could take the matter to court. However, we may decide to investigate if we consider it would be unreasonable to expect the person to go to court. (Local Government Act 1974, section 26(6)(c), as amended)

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How I considered this complaint

5. I considered information provided by Mr X and the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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My assessment

6. The Council owns premises, including a car park, which are used by various different organisations. Car parking spaces, including marked disabled bays, are allocated to the organisations and they decide how to use them.
7. The Council has previously not enforced restrictions on use of the car park as there were more spaces than the organisations needed. But it says that use of the car park in this way has become inappropriate and had the potential to become problematic, so it took the decision to restrict use to the organisations and individuals that the parking spaces are allocated to.
8. Mr X is unhappy with this because it means he can no longer use the disabled bays in the car park. He says this is direct discrimination under the Equality Act 2010 and believes he is entitled to use the disabled parking spaces as other blue badge holders do.
9. But the car park is not a public car park and the Council is entitled to allocate spaces to the organisations which occupy the premises. The decision on how to allocate their spaces is then for the organisations themselves. So if Mr X believes he should be entitled to a car parking space he should take this up with his employer. We cannot say the Council must allocate Mr X, as an employee of one of the organisations, his own parking space when it has contracted with organisations for the use of these spaces. The Council also confirms there is a public car park close by which has its own disabled parking spaces which Mr X may use if they are available.
10. We cannot determine whether the Council has discriminated against Mr X; only the courts can decide this. So if Mr X wishes to pursue this point further he may wish to consider taking action against the Council at court.
11. Mr X is also unhappy with the way the Council dealt with his complaint. But it is not a good use of public resources to look at the Council’s complaints handling if we are not going to look at the substantive issue complained about. We will not therefore investigate this issue separately.

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Final decision

12. We will not investigate this complaint. This is because we cannot determine whether the Council’s actions amount to discrimination. There is not enough evidence of fault by the Council and we cannot achieve the outcome Mr X wants.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman