Local Government

Summary

Mr C complained to the council after being expelled from a council venue whilst distributing literature to other members of the public. During our investigation it became clear that the council staff involved were not aware of the relevant policy at the time of the incident, which led to poor communication with Mr C about why he was being asked to leave. The council had since apologised for this, and provided training to all relevant staff on this matter, which we found to be reasonable. On review of the policy in question, it also became clear that the council staff had discretion to make the decision to expel Mr C, so we did not uphold this aspect of his complaint.

He also complained that the council had failed to follow their complaints procedure. We found that they had failed to stick to their timescales for acknowledging Mr C's complaint, and also failed to contact Mr C to discuss the investigation, despite agreeing to do so. We upheld this complaint, but commented that we did not feel the failings identified would have affected the outcome of the council's investigation.

Recommendations

We recommended that the council:

• apologise for failing to contact Mr C as agreed during their investigation of his complaint, and for the delay in acknowledging his complaint.

Summary

Mr C, a council tenant, complained that the council had failed to repair his floor as it had been damaged by council contractors doing improvement work in his home. He was also unhappy that, when upgrading his bathroom, the council contractors had damaged a shower which belonged to him and which he told them he wanted to keep. Following investigation, we upheld Mr C's complaint that the council had acted unreasonably by failing to action their commitment regarding the flooring. The council have apologised to Mr C and will arrange with Mr C for the work to take place. As the council have already taken action on this, we did not make a recommendation.

We did not uphold Mr C's complaint about the broken shower because we found no evidence to support his recollection that the council were made aware that he wanted to keep the shower.

Summary

Mr C complained that, after serving an emergency statutory notice on his property, the council unreasonably failed to inform him of the costs of associated works, and that they failed to tell him of the increasing cost of these works. In addition, he complained that the council failed to comply with their standing orders when procuring works for three statutory notices, and then failed to manage the works properly in line with the correct procedures.

We found that the council were not required to inform homeowners of the costs of the emergency notice in advance as, by their very nature, emergency works may be needed before the costs are known. The council provided us with some evidence which suggested that Mr C was notified at the time of the increasing costs of the works. Therefore, we concluded that there was not enough evidence to show that he was not informed of the escalating costs. We did not uphold these elements of his complaint.

We found that the council failed to have any reasonable record of the process they followed when tendering for the statutory notices. As a result, we were unable to say whether they followed their standing orders or the correct process. For this reason, we upheld this element of the complaint. We also found that the council had acknowledged carrying out non-emergency works under the emergency statutory notice. This removed the opportunity for neighbours to carry out the works themselves. We noted that the council took this step in order to keep the costs down for residents, as scaffolding was already erected. Nonetheless, the council itself had acknowledged that this was not the correct process, and we upheld this element of the complaint. We made a number of recommendations. These included that the council review their statutory notice procedures, that they refund the administration fee for two of the statutory notices, and that they clarify which aspects of the works were not of an emergency nature and refund the costs of the non-emergency work to Mr C.

Recommendations

We recommended that the council:

• review their statutory notice procedures to ensure that the correct procedures are followed when appointing contractors for works, and that they retain full and appropriate evidence of this process on file in order to demonstrate compliance with their procurement process and standing orders;
• review their procedures to ensure that only works of an emergency nature are carried out by the council;
• refund to Mr C the 15 percent administration fee charged for the works covered under the statutory notices referred to in the decision; and
• clarify which aspects of the works carried out under the emergency statutory notice were not of an emergency nature, and refund the costs of these non-emergency works to Mr C.

Summary

Mr C complained that the council had failed to assess a planning application for a house next to his property. We took independent advice on Mr C's complaint from one of our planning advisers. We found that the council had not assessed the site levels of the new house adequately, and had not correctly anticipated the size a screen fence would have to be to mitigate Mr C's concerns about the loss of privacy for his own property. Therefore, we upheld this aspect of Mr C's complaint.

Mr C also complained that the council did not impose a reasonable planning condition to mitigate the issue of overlooking. He was unhappy that his neighbour had not put up a screen fence and that the council had not taken action to enforce this. We found that the planning condition the council had relied on was not precise enough, and that there was considerable doubt as to whether the council would be able to successfully enforce the planning condition. In view of this, we also upheld this aspect of Mr C's complaint.

Finally, Mr C complained that the council had failed to respond to his complaint within a reasonable timescale. We upheld this aspect of Mr C's complaint as there had been a considerable delay by the council in responding to the complaint and they had not acted in line with their complaints procedure.

Recommendations

We recommended that the council:

• consider recording the details of site visits in their files;
• consider facilitating the provision of an effective screen fence at their cost between the properties, if this is acceptable to Mr C;
• take steps to ensure that their use of planning conditions is in line with the Scottish Government's guidance on the use of conditions in planning permissions;
• issue a reminder to staff in their planning service that complaints must be dealt with in line with their complaints handling procedure; and
• issue a written apology to Mr C.

Summary

Mr C was an objector to a planning application considered by the council's planning committee. He believed that the report on handling considered by the committee contained a number of serious errors which meant the committee had been unable to make an accurate assessment of the application. In particular, Mr C said that the correct planning policies had not been followed and incorrect advice had been given by the council's flood prevention officer on the flood risk to an access road.

We took independent advice from one of our planning advisers. Our adviser said the report on handling had presented an appropriately balanced view of the application and the relevant policies. He said the council had been correct not to include historic reasons for refusal, as they were not applicable to the application under consideration.

Our investigation found that the council's flood prevention officer had acted proportionately in their assessment of the application and, specifically, the access road. Although the council had acknowledged an error in some of their correspondence, this was a matter of millimetres and they were entitled to take a view on whether this was materially significant. We also found the available evidence did not show the report's assessment of the access road was inadequate or inaccurate.

Summary

Mr C complained the council had failed to respond appropriately to his report of a collapsing building. He felt they had not acted quickly enough in response to the original report, which had left the public at risk. He also complained that too much time had been given to the owners of the property to resolve the problem and the council had failed to use their statutory powers appropriately. Mr C said that when the council had taken action and demolished the building, they had left the site in a dangerous condition, inappropriate for a conservation area. He said that the council had also not taken account of the conservation area status that protected the site, by seeking the appropriate consents, despite the 12 months from his first report to the actual demolition of the site. He also complained that part of his boundary wall was demolished unnecessarily.

Our investigation found the council had acted appropriately by giving the owners of the building a reasonable length of time to repair the problem, which would have avoided demolition in a conservation area. The building had continued to deteriorate and the council, acting on the advice of a structural engineer, had had no choice but to demolish the structure. Responsibility for the site remained with the owners and the council had gone beyond their statutory obligations in erecting flood defences. There was no evidence that the boundary wall had been unnecessarily demolished, as it had been taken down as part of making the site safe.

Summary

Mr C told us he received an enforcement notice from the council's debt recovery agent, which said he owed money for unpaid non-domestic rates. Mr C had never had a business or paid non-domestic rates in the council's area. He asked the council to confirm that he did not owe the money, and that his credit rating would not be adversely affected. He asked the council to explain how the error had occurred. Mr C sent a further email after two weeks and, when he did not receive any reply, made a complaint. Even taking into account that the council said they did not receive Mr C's first email, we found it had taken them too long to reply to him and to confirm that he was not the person who owed them money. They exceeded their target timescale for replying to correspondence. There was no evidence that they prioritised Mr C's correspondence considering the error he was alleging or the fact he had made a complaint.

The council's explanations about why the enforcement notice was sent were confused and inaccurate. Due to Mr C's efforts in pursuing the matter, the council later accepted that he should have been sent a much softer letter in order to establish whether he was the person they were trying to find.

We found that the council had not provided a reasonable response to Mr C's complaint. His complaint was acknowledged and responded to within the target timescales at each stage and, rightly, the responses contained an acknowledgement of and apology for the delay. However, at each stage they failed to address the substantive point about the letter sent to Mr C in error.

Recommendations

We recommended that the council:

• apologise to Mr C for the failings identified and for the distress he has outlined; and
• inform Mr C what steps are being taken to address these failings.

Summary

Ms C received a letter from her children’s school outlining the options available to the school in accommodating classes for the next academic year. Ms C believed that a further option was available that had not been considered, so she raised this with the school. The school distributed a second letter stating that this further option had been considered and outlining why it had been rejected. Ms C complained to the council about several aspects of the school's decision and then brought her complaints to us.

Ms C said that the potential further option had not been considered by the school. We considered that the reasons the school gave for the option being rejected had been referred to in their first letter and that, therefore, there was evidence that the option had been considered. We decided that, in these circumstances, there was no evidence of the alleged maladministration or service failure.

Summary

Mr C complained about the service he received from Business Gateway in relation to applications for grants for his new business. He said that he was encouraged to apply for grants but, when his applications were unsuccessful, staff did not respond reasonably to his requests for further information and assistance. When he complained about the service, he said that the council had handled his complaint poorly, and outside the appropriate response timescales.

We noted a lack of contemporary evidence on what was discussed at some of Mr C's meetings with Business Gateway. However, we did not find any evidence that Mr C had been given inaccurate information, though we did note that more detailed information could have been made available about the eligibility criteria for grants. We identified issues with the way that staff informed Mr C of the outcome of his applications, and how clear this information was. His applications had not been successful, but this was not clear from the emails Mr C initially received after a panel considered his applications.

When Mr C complained to the council, they did not initially handle his correspondence as a complaint. We agreed with Mr C that the council were inappropriately applying the timescales in their complaints handling procedure, by taking the day they received a complaint as 'day 0' rather than 'day 1'. Mr C also made a claim for compensation, which he complained had not be appropriately considered. While we found that there was no evidence that the council's legal department had appropriately considered this claim, we explained that it is not our role to assess claims for compensation.

Recommendations

We recommended that the council:

• consider reviewing the information on grant applications to provide more detail in relation to the definitions of ineligibility criteria;
• consider revising their customer service standards leaflet to explain what may happen if an applicant is initially unsuccessful with their grant application, in terms of being provided with the opportunity to provide additional supporting information;
• remind all relevant staff of the importance of handling complaints in line with the complaints handling procedure and the importance of providing a full response to the issues raised;
• provide a full response to Mr C in relation to his claim for compensation; and
• apologise to Mr C for the failings identified.

Summary

Mr C told us that, in error, the council had opened the grave in which his son was buried. When the family discovered the grave had been disturbed, they contacted the council and were initially told the grave had been dug to the depth of two feet and then filled in. We found that the council had not provided a clear and consistent account as the grave had, in fact, been fully prepared for a burial.

The council explained that the mistake was down to administrative error, in that the wrong section row had been identified by a member of administrative staff. Gravediggers also failed to notice or question why the plaque at the grave did not match the details recorded on their work instruction.

We found the council's handling of Mr C's complaint to be relatively poor in view of the clear failings which had caused considerable distress and upset. The complaint was not treated with the degree of priority that it should have been, and Mr C did not receive a proper response to his request for a meeting.

Recommendations

We recommended that the council:

• give a full apology for the distress caused and for the failings identified in this case, and offer an opportunity for the complainants to meet with the chief executive; and
• demonstrate that the lessons learned from this complaint have been communicated to relevant staff members.