Section 32(3) notices (Update 1)

Further to my earlier post regarding Section 32(3) notices I have the following update.

On the 29th September 2009 I submitted the following Freedom of Information request using the What Do They Know website.

Over the last five years how many times has the Secretary of State lifted a (Local Government Act 174 part III) Section 32(3) notice for each Local Government Ombudsman and which councils issued them?

After a delay which forced me to submit a request for an internal review I received the following response.

We are not aware of the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government using his powers under Section 32(3) of Part 3 of the Local Government Act 1974 on any occasion over the last five years.

That means that over the last five years the Local Government Ombudsman can't have asked the Secretary of State to lift a Section 32(3) notice served on them by a Council. Even though some are known to have been wrongly served.

The evidence proving that Local Government Ombudsmen are biased in favour of councils is now overwhelming and can no longer be ignored.

Identifying the bad public authorities

One of the spin of benefits of submitting Freedom of Information requests to a large numer of public authorities is that you can start to identify the good councils, those that supply the information you requested and the poor councils, those who spend more time and effort trying to stop you getting hold of public information than it would take just to give it you in the first place.

It's also quite amusing to read some of the reasons for refusal. Cost grounds is a popular excuse but another more recent excuse emerging is copyright. What councils fail to understand is that the fact information is subject to copyright and restrictions on re-use does not exempt it from disclosure under the Freedom of Information Act. Their position is all the more absurd when you realise that every person in the world could ask for exactly the same information which they are refusing to give to one person (me) just in case it gets published for everyone to read.

Thereby creating the bizarre situation where they may have to deal with thousands of FOI requests for the same information rather than just one. Only a tax payer funded institution would accept the logic of that.

Here is a link to one example

More LGO incompetence hits the Internet

Another citizen who is dissatisfied with Local Government Ombudsman has decided to blog about their experience.

http://woodsofworcester.blogspot.com/

The evidence just keeps on mounting.

LGO: The Ombudsman Enterprise and Administrative Justice

During the select committee investigation into the Role and Investigation of the Local Government Ombudsmen during 2005 one of their friendly professors (also British and Irish Ombudsman Association colleague) Richard Kirkham produced a very pro LGO paper supposedly from a complainants point of view. Although after reading the paper I doubted he had ever met a complainant before writing it.

However, in a more recent paper 'The Ombudsman Enterprise and Administrative Justice: an academic viewpoint' he and a couple of collegues now suggests two things that we have been fighting for since 2003. The article is printed in issue 38 the BIOA news (page 10) which can be downloaded here

1) A Government led review of the ombudsman community is undertaken as soon as practically possible.

2) Revise the accountability arrangements of the local government ombudsmen.

If the Government won't listen to us will they listen to pro ombudsmen and BIOA colleagues like Richard Kirkham?

Recruitment of a replacement Local Government Ombudsman (update 3)

Further to my earlier posts the Recruitment of a replacement Local Government Ombudsman and Recruitment of a replacement Local Government Ombudsman (Update 2) the select committee has now interviewed the Government's preferred new Local Government Ombudsman Dr Jane Martin. You can read a transcript of the interview here. Although the interview was supposed to be a pre-appointment hearing it is obvious from Dr Martin's responses that she already considers the current LGOs as her colleagues. Although she is not an ex Council CEO, which is a good thing, she is still ex Council and, like all the other LGOs, has never had a proper job. In fact she has an academic background without any real world experience which is frightening for a prospective LGO.

The email I sent to the Select Committee has been opened, up to now, on 46 occasions for a total of 1 hour 20 minutes so someone is interested in what I have to say. What concerned me most was her obvious lack of knowledge about such things as local settlements, however, even the panel don't even understand them so her ignorance on the subject was not picked up. We will have to wait and see if she is an improvement on Jerry White or not. Unlike Jerry White though she is at least giving up her part time job rather than trying to do two jobs at once as Jerry did. Even the committee stated that the Local Government Ombudsman's job was a full time role so how an earth Jerry got away with two jobs for so long is a mystery to me.

In anticipation of Dr Jane Martin getting the job I have started a web-page dedicated to her. I have already incorporated her promise to give up her part time work and her political activity. If you have any information about Dr Jane Martin please send it to me so I can add it to her page.

LGO FOI Officer admits supplying false information

Further to an earlier post about the LGO breaking the law, in a new response the LGO FOI officer admit they provided false information when they responding to an earlier Freedom of Information request.

The provisions of the LGPIH in relation to Statements of Reasons are not being ignored by the Local Government Ombudsmen. It seems my letter of 17 August in response to your request (our ref: CS/09/070) “Statement of Reasons” was incorrect when it said: “The Ombudsmen decided not to exercise that power from that date, and this new provision has yet to be implemented.”

So why does the FOI officer now suggest they had earlier supplied false information (A lie by any other name). Probably because the FOI officer stating they supplied false information gets the LGO out of the more serious charge of breaking the law.

The LGO never learn

Further to my earlier post regarding a Freedom of Information request I submitted to the Local Government Ombudsman in order to identify how many Section 32(3) notices were served on the LGO by councils, how many times the LGO has asked the Secretary of State to lift the notice and how many times the LGO had found the council guilty of maladministration for wrongly serving a Section 32(3) on them.

[Section 32(3) of the 1974 Local Government Act is supposed to help councils stop the LGO from disclosing the content of sensitive documents, such as written advice from their legal counsel/barrister or other experts, to the complainant.]

I have now received a similar response to the one I received when I asked them about the number of council officers they had reported for lying to them. Essentially they don't want to give me the information and I can well understand why. It will be another damning indictment of the LGO.

However, just like last time, they may be able to delay my research but they can't stop the truth from eventually coming out. As they couldn't when I published my research into the number of times they had reported a council officer for lying.

I have already started to submit a request to every council in England in order to extract some of the information and another to the government will extract the rest.

As it did with my earlier research it will take quite some time to submit all the FOI requests and elicit the information but it will eventually be published and I have no doubt it will support my theory that the LGO very rarely, if ever, seek to have a Section 32(3) notice lifted or find a council guilty for misusing a Section 32(3) notice.

One of the unexpected spin of benefits of the LGO's refusal to give me the information, forcing me to ask every council in England is that I can link back from every FOI request to my research as I did with my earlier research. This directed well over 1500 people from the What Do They Know website to read the outcome of my research.

Luckily for me the LGO, like most public servants, never learn their lesson and keep shooting themselves in the foot. Look at the additional damage the MPs did when they tried to stop the truth about their expenses being published. All they did was to make themselves look even worse for trying to stop people seeing the information.

New Ombudsman named

Further to my earlier email to the Office of the Deputy Prime minister select committee.

Dr Jane Martin has been named as the preferred candidate for appointment as the next Local Government Ombudsman following a public competition.

Just a pity there wasn't a public consultation regarding the suitability of ex council officers holding the post of Local Government Ombudsman .

Email to the ODPM select committee.

Reference: Pre-appointment hearing with the Government's preferred candidate for Local Government Ombudsman and Deputy Chair of the Commission for Local Administration in England.

Why has the name of the preferred candidate not been published in advance of the hearing so member of the public could, if necessary, raise objections about the preferred candidate?

Yours sincerely

Trevor Nunn

LGO caught out lying again!

On the 11th September I submitted the following Freedom of Information request.

I would like to know on what date,

1) the Commission for Local Administration in England started to factor in the likely cost of an investigation into their decision whether to investigate a complaint or not?

2) you made the department of Communities and Local Government aware that you were no longer deciding to investigate complaints based on merit alone?

3) you made complainants aware that the decision to investigate their complaint would no longer be made on merit alone?

The response from the LGO to my FOI request is as follows.

The answers to the questions you pose in your email of 11 September, are:

1.The Commission does not do this [my emphasis], so there is no date.
2.Never (see above).
3.Never (see above).

Oh no? Mrs Seex clearly uses costs as reason for not investigating complaints about council officer conduct. See an extract from a letter I have been given below. No wonder the LGO very rarely identify council officer wrongdoing, they don't even look. Clearly using costs as a reason for not doing so!

Contents of a recent letter sent by Mr Hobbs, Assistant Ombudsman, York LGO office to a complainant.

'Of course the Ombudsman [Mrs Seex] does not condone any council or its officers flouting policies or the law but what she does do is consider whether it is in the public interest and whether it is a good use of scarce public resources to pursue complaints about council officer conduct as opposed to complaints about more substantive maladministration causing injustice.' [My annotation] [My Bolding]

So what is the truth?

How many people complain to the DCLG about the LGO

On the 28th August 2009 I submitted the following Freedom of Information request via the What Do They Know website

'I would like to know how many complaints (letters of dissatisfaction) have been submitted to your department about the Local Government Ombudsman over the last five years.'

I received the following response on the 23rd September 2009

'Thank you for your request, received on 28^th August, for information about the number of complaints the Department has received about the Local Government Ombudsman over the last five years. Your request has been considered under the Freedom of Information Act 2000.

Unfortunately it will not be possible to provide you with the information you have asked for. This is because I estimate the cost of searching for, extracting and supplying you with all the information relevant to your request would be in the region of £1,000. We are not obliged to provide information if the cost exceeds £600'

Their response implies that they don't keep records of complaints about the Local Government Ombudsman and the only way they could provide a response to my FOI request was to search all correspondence over the last five years.

Before I requested an internal review I decided to submit the following message to clarify my understanding of the situation.

'Just to confirm the situation, are you implying that you don't record complaints against the LGO and that the only way you can identify the number of complaints submitted to your office over the last five years is to look at every letters received by your office over that period?

If that is the case I would like to know how you keep ministers aware of the number of complaints against the LGO.'

On the 30th September I received an acknowledgement

'Trevor - Thank you for your email below. A response is being prepared and we will send a reply to you shortly.'

I await their final response but will if necessary submit a complaint to the Information Commissioner because it is absolutely ridiculous to suggest that they don't keep a record of a citizen's dissatisfaction with an organisation that they sponsor and only use the LGO annual reports, statistics and surveys as the basis for deciding whether or not the LGO, as a tax payer funded quango, are providing an adequate system of administrative justice.

Fact: It cost the taxpayer over 6 times more to fund the LGO than they recommend as settlements for public authority wrongdoing.

LGO: More ways to reduce investigations?

It has come to my attention that the LGO are now sending out letters to complainants using the cost of investigation their complaint as an additional factor for not doing so.

The LGO already use their discretion not to investigate if they don't think a complainant has suffered enough injustice to warrant an investigation. They also use their discretion not to investigate a complaint if they don't think the maladministration is bad enough to warrant an investigation.

Read more about this here and here and then read this which proves this is a new(ish) phenomenon.

However, it would now appear that they are also using their discretion not to investigate a complaint if it is going to cost them too much money to do so. That means that complainants need to suffer a substantial amount of injustice through a serious act of council maladministration that can be investigated on the cheap before the LGO will investigate your complaint.

I have submitted a Freedom of Information request to identify when this insidious policy started.

I would like to know on what date,

1) the Commission for Local Administration in England started to factor in the likely cost of an investigation into their decision whether to investigate a complaint or not?

2) you made the department of Communities and Local Government aware that you were no longer deciding to investigate complaints based on merit alone?

3) you made complainants aware that the decision to investigate their complaint would no longer be made on merit alone?

Here is an existing LGO policy designed to save money

Even if a complainant manages to get through the above and persuade the LGO to investigate all they usually do is ring up the council and ask them if they have done anything wrong. If the council say no the LGO refuses to investigate further. Don't beleive me? Well that is what they did in the famous Balchins case in 1999 and they did it to me when I submitted my second complaint during 2002. I even have a letter from an Assistant Ombudsman who argues there is nothing wrong with that approach. More here

Persistently unreasonable LGO FOI officer?

On the 18th September I started to write an on-line Freedom of Information request which I intended to send to the LGO via the What Do They Know website. Unfortunately, due to a computer glitch together with a fault on the What Do they Know website, the FOI request was submitted to the LGO before I had finished drafting it.

I immediately contacted the WDTK website, they acknowledged a fault with the website and marked this particular FOI request as withdrawn. I also sent the LGO a follow up note to the withdrawn request using the WDTK website.

Please ignore this particular FOI request. A final version of this draft FOI request has now been submitted and can be read here. (This linked to the final version of my Freedom of Information request I had just submitted.)

Unfortunately the LGO had some difficulty understanding the situation and sent the following message in response to the FOI request I had clearly withdrawn. (This was the one marked by the WDTK website as withdrawn until the LGO reactivated it by sending a response.)

You have sent three messages with the same title. In the message below you refer to a draft FOI request on the 'whatdotheyknow' website. If you wish to submit a request to us, please do so - I don't intend to look at 'draft' requests elsewhere.

So as things stand, I will not respond further to any of these three messages (the other two are attached).

In response I sent the following message

I have NOT submitted three versions of this request. I was in the process of writing this FOI request when their was a glitch on the website. Therefore, I withdrew this request and submitted a final version. I have made the position very clear so if you fail to respond to the other Freedom of Information request on this subject I will submit a complaint to the Information Commissioner.

In response I received the following message, again to the FOI request I had withdrawn.

You HAVE submitted three emails with the same title. I want to be sure I am responding to the right one. Your third email suggested I look at a link to a 'draft FOI request'. I suggested you submit a 'final FOI request'. If you could send a 'final' request, I will respond to it.

As a result I sent the following message.

Will you stop responding to the FOI request I withdrew and respond to the final request here.

http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/ce...

I have now made the position quite clear on two occasions please stop playing silly games and respond to the FOI request I have NOT withdrawn and stop responding to the one I have withdrawn.

The can follow the story as it unfolds because I have submitted a request for an internal review and will if necessary submit a complaint to the Information Commissioner.

The WITHDRAWN FOI request

http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/certified_offences_to_the_high_c

The FINAL FOI request

http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/certified_offences_to_the_high_c_2

which the LGO FOI officer is doing their best to ignore by sending all responses via the withdrawn request.

I also added the following note which explains how all FOI requests made via the WDTK website have unique URLs. Note the 2 on the end of the second and final request.

To further clarify the situation all FOI requests have a unique URL so it is not that difficult for an authority to identify an individual request, keep track of it and respond to it rather than other requests from the same requester.

FOOTNOTE: If you check out all LGO responses to various FOI requests on the What Do They Know website you will find that on a number of occasions they have sent an amended version of correspondence and withdrawn an earlier version, so the concept can't be unknown to them.

UPDATE

I have asked the What Do They Know website to mark the withdrawn request as withdrawn once again, which they have done. I have also, for a third time and final time tried to explain the situation to the LGO.

A third and final attempt to get you to respond to this FOI request before I submit a complaint to the Information Commissioner.

I submitted a Freedom of Information request on the 18th September 2009.

[Over the last five years how many certified offences has each LGO brought to the attention of the High Court, how many involved a council member or officer, what were the outcomes and which council did the member or officers work for.]

This was submitted via the What Do They Know website and has a unique URL and reply address. Full details can be seen by viewed at

http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/ce...

Unfortunately for some reason your office insists on responding to a different Freedom of Information request. One which I had withdrawn which has also has a unique URL and reply address.

Even when I submitted an internal review request regarding

http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/ce...

You wrongly replied to the withdrawn FOI request. Just what do I have to do to get you to respond to a valid FOI request and ignore one that was clearly withdrawn?

I have no intention of following the suggestion in your response to my withdrawn FOI request by submitting a third request.

I have submitted a valid Freedom of Information request via the What Do They Know website and I demand a response.

http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/ce...

We will just have to wait and see if they yet again send a response to the wrong FOI request and re-activate it or this time respond to the correct FOI request.

Certified offences to the High Court

The 1974 Local Government Act Part III states

Section 29

'For the purposes of an investigation under this Part of this Act a Local Commissioner may require any member or officer of the authority concerned, or any other person who in his opinion is able to furnish information or produce documents relevant to the investigation, to furnish any such information or produce any such documents.

For the purposes of any such investigation a Local Commissioner shall have the same powers as the High Court in respect of the attendance and examination of witnesses, and in respect of the production of documents.

If any person without lawful excuse obstructs a Local Commissioner in the performance of his functions under this Part of this Act, or any officer of the Commission assisting in the performance of those functions, or is guilty of any act or omission in relation to an investigation under this Part of this Act which, if that investigation were a proceeding in the High Court, would constitute contempt of court, the Local Commissioner may certify the offence to the High Court.'

In order to identify how many times each Ombudsman has used this power over the last five years I submitted the following Freedom of Information request.

'Over the last five years how many certified offences has each LGO brought to the attention of the High Court, how many involved a council member or officer, what were the outcomes and which council did the member or officers work for.'

I think the answer will be never (or at the most a couple of times) but we will have to wait and see.

Section 32(3) notices

The council wrongly served a Section 32(3) notice on the LGO during my complaint but the LGO didn't do anything about it. Just let the council waste everyone's time with impunity. The LGO didn't even attempt to get the notice lifted and only persuaded the council to lift the notice after many months of pressure from me.

Therefore, I thought it would be interesting to find out just how many notices were served on the LGO by councils, how many times the LGO has asked the Secretary of State to lift the notice and how many times the LGO had found the council guilty of maladministration for wrongly serving a Section 32(3) on them.

My Freedom of Information request can be read here. As with my previous Freedom of Information requests to the Local Government Ombudsman if they try to avoid giving me the information I will make the same request to every single council in country. [I had to do this when they refused to tell me how many times they had informed a council that a council officer had lied to them during an investigation. Not only did I get the information the resonses clearly indicate why the LGO did not want the information to become public knowledge.]

For those that don't know what a Section 32(3) notice is the following may be of interest.

Section 32(3) of the 1974 Local Government Act is supposed to help councils stop the LGO from disclosing the content of sensitive documents, such as written advice from their legal counsel/barrister or other experts, to the complainant.

During an investigation the LGO should, but often don't, ask the council for a defence to the complainants allegations together with their evidence. On many occasions the council don't even want the complainant to even see and their defence let alone the advice given to them by their own legal counsel. On other occasions they don't want the complainant to find out they have no evidence to support their position.

Therefore, many councils wrongly serve a Section 32(3) notice on the LGO to stop them giving the complainant information which they are actually entitled to. Unfortunately this stops the LGO in their tracks because they cannot give the complainant any knowledge of the information subject to the Section 32(3) notice.

What the LGO should do, if they feel the council is wrongly using the notice to delay the investigation, is immediately ask the Secretary of State to lift the notice. However, they very rarely, if ever, do so, they normally waste the next few months and sometimes years trying to sweet talk the council into lifting the notice voluntarily.

After the council has used the delay to their advantage they eventually comply and lift the notice so the investigation into the complaint against them can continue. The LGO then quietly forgets that the council misused a Section 32(3) notice.

During the long delay between the serving of the Section 32(3) notice and the eventual lifting of the notice the council has given themselves more than enough time to go through the complaint against them in detail and construct a much better defence to the complaint than would have otherwise been the case. All whilst the LGO stands idly by watching from the sidelines.

When the investigation continues the complainant is usually faced with some 'newly identified/created evidence' to support the councils position, which the LGO accept and promptly close down the complaint without giving the complainant the time to properly respond to the 'new evidence'.

If you ever go to court you will find that they have a system that ensure the simultaneous transmission of evidence between parties. Can you imaging if one party managed to get the other party's evidence months before they had to disclose theirs? The advantage is obvious but something that our so called 'impartial' Local Government Ombudsmen let happen on a daily basis.

More on this subject when I receive a response to my Freedom of Information request.

Yet another concidence?

Further to my earlier post Coincidence?

The LGO has recently identified that a council planning officer fabricated misleading evidence. Has the council sacked the culprit and why didn't the LGO identify the officer?

'Bernard Gooch and his wife Julia were surprised to see pictures of a strange car parked on the field being used as evidence against them.

They were even more surprised when Mrs Gooch discovered the blue Vauxhall Corsa belonged to a planning official involved in the case.'

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1212483/Couple-wins-apology-council-fakes-car-photographs-planning-row-field.html#ixzz0QinzCzRB

Would the LGO have done so without my research exposing their previous failure? I doubt it!

Coincidence?

Within a few short weeks of my research being published (about the LGO's willingness to accept everything a council officer tells them together with their failure to report the fact that a council officer had lied during an investigation) the York office actually published a report about a council officer lying to them. That is something they have never done before. Coincidence or an attempt to minimise the damage done by my research? You be the judge.

Amazing what you can get Local Government Ombudsmen to do when you corner them like rats in a trap.

The current LGOs should fall on their swords

The current LGOs have broken the law on numerous occasions over the last few years, however, the situation is made much worse when you take into account that they are responsible for Local Administrative Justice in England.

I always thought people in positions like that, who were caught breaking the law, were forced to resign. I am sure a judge would be forced to resign if they were caught breaking the law once, let alone on a regular basis.

I know that the communities and local government department of the government are aware of many of the problems with the LGO but are unwilling to take appropriate corrective action.

In addition I also know that the government petition website cannot be trusted because they have removed names from a number of anti LGO petition and kept no records as to number of names removed ot the reason for their removal.

Luckily, the Local Government Act allows the Queen to remove the LGOs for misbehaviour.

Local Government Act 1974 Part III Section 23(6)

A [Local] Commissioner may be relieved of office by Her Majesty at his own request or may be removed from office by Her Majesty on grounds of incapacity or misbehaviour.

[The word Local was later repealed by the Local Government and Housing Act 1989 (c. 42, SIF 81:1, 2), ss. 22(4), 194(4), Sch. 12 Pt. II]

Therefore, if the current commissioners have not resigned voluntarily within the next 3 months I have decided to petition the Queen in an attempt to have them removed.

However, I will not limit my petition to their law breaking, I will also include a summary of everything else that could also be classed as misbehaviour. As one example, there are many more, the time they lied to the government about their true compliance rates.

LGO broke the law in 2006

The LGO are also under a legal duty to submit a triennial review but didn't in 2006. Although they later tried to excuse this unlawful act by suggesting they were given implied consent by the DCLG, however, what they fail to understand that the DCLG cannot give them, or anyone else, express or implied consent to break the law. Why Anne Seex, York LGO, who has had some legal training, didn't know that is anyone's guess.

The LGO clearly broke the law in 2006 when they failed to produce a triennial review.

LGO have been breaking the law since April 2008

On the 1st April 2008 the Local Government and Public Involvement in Health Act 2007 came into force. Part 9 of the Act concerns the Local Government Ombudsman.

Section 175

(1C) If a Local Commissioner decides—

(a) not to investigate a matter, or

(b) to discontinue an investigation of a matter,

he shall prepare a statement of his reasons for the decision and send a copy to each of the persons concerned.

However following a Freedom of Information request about the issue of statements of reasons the Local Government Ombudsman responded with the following statement.

The Ombudsman's power to issue a statement of reasons on a complaint was brought in by the Local Government and Public Involvement in Health Act 2007, which came into force on 1 April 2008. However, the Ombudsmen decided not to exercise that power from that date, and this new provision has yet to be implemented. So no statements of reasons have yet been produced; the information you request is not held.

However, the Act gives the Local Government Ombudsman no discretion over whether to issue a statement of their reason under the following conditions, If they decide

(a) not to investigate a matter, or

(b) to discontinue an investigation of a matter,

The Act clearly places a mandatory obligation on Local Government Ombudsmen to produce a statement of their reasons,

he shall prepare a statement of his reasons for the decision and send a copy to each of the persons concerned.

In their response to the Freedom of Information request the Local Government Ombudsman openly admit they have not produced any statements of reasons since the Act became law which means the Local Government Ombudsman has been breaking the law since the 1st April 2008.

I wonder how many other laws has the Local Government Ombudsman decided to ignore since 1974?

LGO guilty of promoting double standards

In an earlier post I reproduced the unredacted email that Nigel Karney (LGO) sent to Stephen McAllister (DCLG) about the LGO's compliance rates. I had earlier obtained a redacted copy but was interested in why the had sent me a redacted copy of the email. Just what didn't they want me to see? The bit they didn't want me to see is reproduced below.

'We feel very strongly that your petition response should be specific to complaints under our current jurisdiction covering local government and similar public bodies. Your current wording reads as a statement that would cover all circumstances.

As you are aware, the Ombudsmen are in discussion with the government about the possibility of binding recommendations being appropriate for `self funders'. This is on the basis that this sector does not have a mature relationship with an ombudsman type organisation. Furthermore, the private sector may be less likely to be persuaded by the sanction of a published response to a further report and, in many cases, publicity will not be in the best interests of the complainant.' [My emphasis]

It is clear that the LGO want their recommendations binding for others but not their friends in local authorities. Why, when an ever growing number of local authorities are refusing to follow their recommendations, don't they want to make them binding on local authorities?

Mr Karney states that the reason is due to their mature relationship with local authorities. What utter rubbish. But what can you expect from a man that, as a reason for refusing to supply information under the Freedom of Information Act about the number of ex central government staff they employed, stated that the request was vexatious because it was no different than asking how many of their staff had brown hair. As everyone knows the LGO argue they are independent of central government, however, I have never heard them argue they are independent of people with brown hair.

They don't appear to understand that this fallacious twaddle they insist on using to excuse their actions just makes them look like idiots. In addition how does he know publicity will not be in the best interests of the complainant. Has he ever asked anyone?

Exposing the truth forces the LGO to change

A council officer provided incorrect and seriously misleading information to the Ombudsman regarding my case yet Mrs Seex failed to bring this to the attention of the council during her investigation or in her 2008 report.

Since my earlier posts about Local Government Ombudsmen always believing the council/ignoring council officer lies and my research into the subject, it looks as if Local Government Ombudsmen have now decided to change their ways. Just a pity they are only doing so to cover their backsides now my research has exposed their failures of the past The following statement was recently published in a Telegraph article.

'The Ombudsman found that the Council

'..........had provided “incorrect and seriously misleading information” to her during her inquiry.'

Read the full Telegraph article here.

I wonder if the officer concerned has been disciplined by the council? I doubt it. Although the LGO now appear to be bringing council officer lies to the attention of the council they don't appear to be doing anything else about the issue.

In any event what about all the people who have suffered over the last 25 years because of the LGO's stupid and biased policy of accepting everything a council officers says without validation and then ignoring the problem when evidence later proves they have lied?

At least what Mrs Seex was forced to do with Lewisham proves one of my earlier quotes about Local Government Ombudsmen. They work well when cornered like a rat in a trap

Graham Crane's petition (Last few days)

There are only a few days left in which to sign the petition to scrap the LGO. Please consider signing the petition before the 5th September 2009.

If Graham manages to get over 200 signatures the Government will have to provide a response. One of their earlier responses to a petition provided evidence that the LGO misled the Government over their true compliance rates. Every successful petition, irrespective of the Government's response, is another nail in the LGO coffin.

Don't forget that every family member can sign as long as they have a unique email address. Same goes for your friends and wider family.

It only takes a few seconds to sign and could help put a stop to the injustice and misery the LGO are guilty of perpetrating. Click here to sign

Last day to sign is the 5th September 2009

Footnote: At about 9pm on Sunday the 30th August 2009 the 200th person signed Graham's petition. However, please continue to sign because we are aware that the government often remove names from petitions without warning.

The truth is out (Update 1)

Further to my earlier post the truth is out

I submitted a follow up Freedom of information request to the LGO in order to obtain an unredacted copy of the email that Nigel Karney (LGO) sent to Stephen McAllister (DCLG) about the LGO's compliance rates. I also asked the Department of Communities and Local Government for a copy just in case the LGO tried to block my request. I have now received a response from the LGO and the email is copied below. I also received a response from the DCLG on the very same day.

Stephen

The compliance rate in 2007/08 was also 100%. But it is important to appreciate that this reflects our relationship with bodies in jurisdiction that has matured to high levels of respect over a 30 year history. The rate of compliance was very different in the early years of our scheme

We feel very strongly that your petition response should be specific to complaints under our current jurisdiction covering local government and similar public bodies. Your current wording reads as a statement that would cover all circumstances.

As you are aware, the Ombudsmen are in discussion with the government about the possibility of binding recommendations being appropriate for `self funders'. This is on the basis that this sector does not have a mature relationship with an ombudsman type organisation. Furthermore, the private sector may be less likely to be persuaded by the sanction of a published response to a further report and, in many cases, publicity will not be in the best interests of the complainant.

Regards

Nigel

I will comment on the content of the email in my next post.

Humorous quotes about the LGO

Local Government Ombudsmen,

• would get a rebate if the Government taxed justice.
• are a Government experiment in Artificial Stupidity.
• have delusions of adequacy.
• would be out of their depth in a puddle.
• are diagonally parked in a parallel universe.
• bring a lot of joy when they leave a room.
• are so dense light bends around them.
• are gross incompetents - that's 144 times more incompetent that other Ombudsmen.
• have flippers further apart in the pinball game of justice.
• have an intellect rivalled only by garden tools.
• all froth and no beer.
• proof that evolution can go in reverse.
• work well when cornered like a rat in a trap.
• are depriving other public sector organisations of an idiot.
• have a photographic memory but with the lens cap on.
• will give you change if you give them a penny for their thoughts.
• can't find their ass with two hands and a mirror.
  

Number 10 Petition Website not to be trusted.

Following a freedom if information request to identify the following

How many names/signatures your office has removed from approved petitions, the reasons for their removal, the url of the petitions that names/signatures have been removed from.

I have identified that Number 10 do not keep accesible records of how many signatures have been removed, the reason for their removal or the petition they were rmoved from.

Although they stated that they have the right to remove a name that consists of more than just a name this is obviously discretionary because many petitions have entries that consist of more than just a name, Here is an example. Ironically they have left my name on this petition whilst removing it from others.

Unfortunately, the way Number 10 currently run the petition website leaves it open to serious abuse because anyone with access can remove as many names as they wish from any petition without having to account for their actions.

As a result, from today I am recomending that people use an alternative petition website because the Number 10 clearly cannot be trusted. Here are a number of others for people to consider.

Lobbyingforum ipetitions care2 petitionOnline petition.co.uk

I for one will never sign another Number 10 petition until this abuse is stopped.

Recruitment of a replacement Local Government Ombudsman (Update 3)

Further to my previous posts

Recruitment of a replacement Local Government Ombudsman,
Recruitment of a replacement Local Government Ombudsman(Update 1)
and Recruitment of a replacement Local Government Ombudsman (Update 2)

I have now had a response to a freedom of information request to the LGO

'I would like to know when Tony Redmond, the Chair of the Commission for Local administration, was first made aware that Jerry White, a Local Government Ombudsmen, was leaving the commission.'

Although Mrs Pook doesn't think it appropriate I ask the question she ignores the fact that the delay, in Mr White's resignation becoming known to the CLAE and DCLG was used as an excuse to seek a post-appointment rather than pre-appointment hearing against the wishes of the Government. As usual something stinks in the world of the LGO but at least the Minister concerned has refused an application to hold a post appointment hearing.

Unfortunately for the LGO they will now be an Ombudsman down until the proper procedure is followed. This would appear to mean that Redmond and Seex will have to split White's workload until a replacement had been recruited. If only they had followed the correct procedure in the first place!

Out of interest the Department of Communities and Local Government were notified by White of his intention to resign on the 23rd September 2008. However, they failed to advertise for a replacement for a further 6 months.

The LGO always believe the council. Update 2.

Further to my initial post The LGO always believe the council and the update The LGO always believe the council. Update 1 I am now close to completing my research. Only a few Freedom of Information requests still to come in but with the majority now in I thought it was time to publish the outcome of my research to date. With close to 400 hundred Council responses to collate it has produced a large document. As a result I decided to publish my finding on the Ombudsman Watchers website and link to it here. The results are exactly what I expected. Up to now the Local Government Ombudsman has not brought one incident of a Council Officer misleading or lying to them to the attention of a Council over the last 5 years following which the Council Officer concerned has faced any proper disciplinary consequences. Whilst this could be explained away by arguing that no council officer has ever lied to or misled the Ombudsman, it would be an answer that most people would consider a statistical impossibility. In any event I have also provided evidence of a council officer lying to the LGO during 2002 which the LGO subsequently ignored. In addition, this was not an isolated incidence as readers will see when I publish my full response to the Ombudsman's final report.

If any reader has evidence similar to mine please send it to me so I can add it to the final part of my research on this subject.

The Truth is out, now the Audit Commision know!

Following my earlier post 'The truth is out' I noticed that the Audit Commision had visited my blog. They arrived via the link on the What Do They Know Website read my post about Nigel Karney misleading the Department of Communities and Local Government and then checked out my personal profile.

The links clicked on by the Audit Commission are reproduced below.

Referring URL http://www.whatdothe...information_given_to
Visit Entry Page http://lgowatcher.bl...07/truth-is-out.html
Visit Exit Page http://lgowatcher.bl...07/truth-is-out.html
Out Click http://www.blogger.c...13970042186955611938

Head in the sand or deliberately ignoring the evidence?

An extract from the minutes of the meeting of the Commission held at Millbank Tower, Millbank, London SW1P 4QP in the Board Room, 15th floor on Tuesday 29 January 2008 at 11.30am.

Mick King updated the Commission on his and Anne Seex’s researches into possible reasons for the increasing downwards trend in complaints received by the York office (18.7% fewer in the month of December; 10.5% fewer in the past 12 months). Their researches suggested the following contributory factors:

• The transfers out of authorities -Trafford and Tower Hamlets.
• A steady overall decline in categories of complaint, in contrast to rises in some of the categories in London and Coventry eg complaints about parking and council tax.
• Analysis of the number of complaints received by authority revealed that, of the 10 authorities with the biggest decline in LGO complaints, eight had been the focus of LGO activities such as training and specific YMT initiatives. Mick King did however stress that it was too soon to be certain about this factor and that further research would be needed. He had, however, raised this with Theresa Kimble (York Communications project officer) who had noted a similar trend in other local authorities where training had taken place.

Anne Seex added that a further factor was the continuing transfer of council housing stock to registered social landlords by a number of northern authorities; this could help to explain the decline in the number of housing complaints received by York (which had increased in London and Coventry).

The report was noted by the Commission.

How typical of Local Government Ombudsmen, ignoring evidence that's right under their noses. What is the main reason why any organisation loses customers? Because the organisation in question provides a poor quality service or product, common sense to most people but obviously rocket science to the LGO.

The bottom line is that the service they offer stinks. Their staff, often

• lie to complainants
• accept the word of council staff (even when overwhelming evidence to the contrary is available)
• interpret evidence, the law, codes and guidelines in favour of the council
• assist councils by fabricating documents
• use fallacious reasoning to support the councils position
• disregard evidence and in some cases whole complaints

And the list goes on and on.

Over the years the government has continually expanded their remit to increase the number of people submitting complaints but even that can't mask the fact that their customers are deserting them in droves for one simple reason. They do not offer the impartial service they advertise. The system of administrative justice in England stinks and will continue to stink until the LGO are replaced by an open and honest tribunal system that is not controlled and manned by ex council staff.

Footnote: Ironically one of the reasons they gave for complaint numbers being on a downward trend is because Trafford Council was transferred from the York office to the Coventry office. However, Trafford like most of their other customers has simply had enough of the discredited York office and requested a change of Ombudsman. Just a pity complainants can't do the same!

Recruitment of a replacement Local Government Ombudsman (Update 2)

When I found out that they were recruiting a new Ombudsman to replace Jerry White, Coventry, I sent an email outlining my concerns to the scrutiny committee on the 1st June 2009. On the 10th of June 2009 I received an acknowledgement. Yesterday I decided to check my email statistics and noticed that between the 1st June 2009 and the 22nd June 2009 my email had been read on 36 separate occasions. I think that may well be a record for one of my emails. Better still they clicked on all the links I had included. Now we know who visited my blog on the 20th and 22nd June 2009 from the Houses of Parliament. See visitor stats in the last post.

Didn't take long. See post below 'The truth is out' (Updated 22/7/09)

The truth is out!

Introduction

Evidence proving that Nigel Karney, Deputy Chief Executive & Secretary of the Commission for Local Administration in England (CLAE), more commonly known as Local Government Ombudsmen (LGO), provided misleading information to the Department of Communities and Local Government (DCLG) regarding the LGOs true compliance rates for the year 2007/8.

Background summary

A few years ago Wilma Wright submitted a complaint to the Local Government Ombudsman (LGO) because Trafford Council had not fulfilled its statutory obligations regarding her daughter’s special housing needs. Eventually the York based LGO, Ann Seex, found in her favour (an extremely rare event as Mrs Seex produces very few findings of maldministration), and recommended a remedy for the maladministration she had found Trafford Council guilty of committing. Unfortunately for Wilma Wright and her daughter Trafford Council refused to provide the remedy recommended by Mrs Seex. (as many other councils have also done) [Refer to appendix 1 at the end for more information about the relationship between Trafford Council and Mrs Seex]

As a result of Trafford Council’s failure to provide the remedy recommended by Mrs Seex and lacking the financial support necessary to take legal action or seek a judicial review, Mrs Wright decided to petition the Prime Minister to make the recommendations of a Local Government Ombudsman mandatory. [Refer to appendix 2 at the end for more information.]

Mrs Wright’s petition managed to achieve the appropriate number of signatures to guarantee a response from the Prime Minister's office. Unfortunately, the response from the Prime Minister's office included a material inaccuracy. It wrongly stated that the LGO’s compliance rate, during 2007/8, was 100%. The Prime Minister's office response was not only blatantly wrong, it was downright ridiculous because, as anyone could see, Mrs Wright’s petition would not have existed if the LGO’s compliance rate was 100%. [Refer to appendix 3 at the end for more information]

My investigation

Having helped Wilma Wright with her petition and as a signatory I was incensed at the Prime Minister's office response of the 27th March 2009 for two reasons. Firstly, the material inaccuracy and secondly, the fact that nobody who had actually read the petition, would have ever suggested that the LGO’s compliance rates were 100%. How could they be 100% when the Prime Minister's Office was responding to a petition that was based on the non compliance of an LGO’s recommended remedy? [Refer to appendix 4 at the end for more information.]

Therefore, I decided to do something about the situation and chose to use the Freedom of Information (FOI) Act to track down the person responsible for the material inaccuracy in the Prime Minister's office response to Wilma Wright’s petition. To make the whole process transparent I also decided to use the excellent What Do They Know website to submit my requests.

On the 1st April 2009 my first FOI request was submitted to Number 10. They responded on the 1st May 2009 and stated that the wrong information had been provided by the Department of Communities and Local Government.

On the 1st May 2009 my second FOI request was submitted to the DCLG. They responded on he 3rd June 2009 and stated that the wrong information had been provided by the Local Government Ombudsman.

On the 3rd June 2009 my third FOI request was submitted to the LGO. They responded on the 26th June 2009 and stated that they had supplied documents to the DCLG during May 2008 showing that during 2007/8 they didn't have a 100% compliance rate. (Conveniently ignoring the fact that Nigel Karney, a senior member of their staff, had, during November 2008, sent an email response to the DCLG wrongly confirming that the LGO had a 100% compliance rate for the period 2007/8.)

On the 26th June 2009 my fourth FOI request was submitted to the DCLG. They responded on the 16th July and stated that Mr Nigel Karney, Deputy Chief Executive & Secretary of the Commission for Local Administration in England had, in an email of the 11th November 2008, confirmed that the LGO’s compliance rate was 100%.

On the 16th July 2009 my Fifth FOI request was submitted to the LGO but just after I had submitted it I received a belated supplementary response from the LGO to my third FOI request. In this response they attach a copy of the email that they had previously overlooked proving that Mr Nigel Karney, Deputy Chief Executive & Secretary of the Commission for Local Administration in England had responded to the DCLG and confirmed that their compliance rates were 100%.

The email and response in question

*********************************************************************************

Email from Stephen McAllister DCLG to Nigel Karney CLAE, 11 November 2008 11:49 AM [Refer to appendix 5 at the end for more information]

Nigel,

I'm drafting a response to a number 10 e petition requesting that the Ombudsman's recommendations for authorities be binding.

[Paragraph not related to the % omitted]

I believe that the compliance rate with recommendations was 100% in 2006-2007.
Do you have a figure for what it was in 2007-2008? [my emphasis]

Regards, Steve McAllister

Response from Nigel Karney, November 11, 2008 5:23 PM

Stephen

The compliance rate in 2007/08 was also 100%. [my emphasis]

[Paragraphs not related to the % omitted]

Regards, Nigel

*********************************************************************************

Summary

After nearly 4 months, and five FOI requests I manage to track down the culprit who was responsible for the wrong and misleading response by the Prime Minister's office to Wilma Wright’s petition. The culprit was Nigel Karney Deputy Chief Executive & Secretary of the Commission for Local Administration in England.

He told the DCLG that the LGO's compliance rate for 2007/8 was 100% when it wasn't!

Appendix 1: Trafford Council also wrote to the Commission for Local Administration in England (CLAE), the official name of the three English Local Government Ombudsmen, and demanded that in future another Ombudsman should investigate complaints about Trafford Council. The CLAE agreed and the Coventry Ombudsman took over the responsibility for investigating complaints against Trafford Council.

Appendix 2: The public are not generally aware that councils are free to ignore Local Government Ombudsmen with impunity. However, more Councils ignore Mrs Seex than any other Local Government Ombudsman.

Appendix 3: Mrs Wright’s case is not an isolated incidence. Over the last 10 years a significant number of Councils have failed to provide the remedy recommended by a Local Government Ombudsman. Unfortunately the LGO utilise a number of tactics to reduce the true level of non compliance ever becoming public knowledge. The most commonly used tactic is when they state they are satisfied with a remedy even when a much lesser remedy (or on occasions none at all) has been provided. Another is when they renegotiate the remedy with the Council making it easier for a Council to comply.

Appendix 4: This rather proves that Number 10 cannot be bothered to read petitions properly before responding to them.

Appendix 5: Note that Stephen McAllister was asking for information from the LGO 3days after Wilma Wrights petition had closed yet it took until the 27th March 2009 for the Prime Ministers office to respond to her petition.

Back with a vengeance!

After a few health problems and a holiday I am now back with a vengeance and normal service will be resumed very shortly.

In the next few days I will be publishing

1) the conclusion to my attempt to identify the person or persons who lied about the LGO's compliance rates.

2) the conclusion to my attempt to identify the number of times the LGO has ever brought to the attention of a council the fact that one of their staff had lied to, or misled them.

3) an irrefutable example of an Ombudsman ignoring the fact that a council solicitor had lied to them.

If you have not done so already please can I remind you to sign Graham Crane's petition to get rid of the LGO. Sign it here.

Recruitment of a replacement Local Government Ombudsman: Update

Further to my earlier post on the subject I have just received a response to my email.

Dear Trevor Nunn

Thank you for your e-mail, which has been passed on to the Clerk of the Committee. I will ensure that you are sent any announcements relating to the Committee's pre-appointment hearing with the Government's preferred candidate for the post of Local Government Ombudsman.

Regards
Nicola McCoy 

New petition to get rid of the LGO

I note another petition has been submitted to get rid of the Local Government Ombudsman by Graham Crane. Is this a record? I don't know of any other ombudsman in the world who has had so petitions submitted about them. Mind you I don't know of any other ombudsman in the world who is as bad as the Local Government Ombudsman so that may well explain things.

The petition reads,

'We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to scrap the local government ombudsman (LGO) as they serve no useful purpose to members of the public they are supposed to serve. According to my own experience and that of others recorded on many web sites, the local government ombudsman serves only to protect Local Authorities interests and serves no useful purpose to members of the public. The people who work for them are ex-council officials and civil servants who take the council’s side regardless of how overwhelming the evidence is. In the tiny number of cases they do find for the public the compensation and remedies are totally inadequate. In these times when we need to save money they are an ideal candidate to cut and as soon as possible.'

If you would like to sign the petition click here. Don't forget to tell your friends and family to sign as well.

LGO did lie to the DCLG about their 2006-2008 compliance rates.

The Full story

My first post on the subject. (reproduced below)

A few months ago Wilma Wright submitted a petition because Trafford Council refused to accept the York Ombudsman's recommendations.

The Government have recently responded to Wilma's petition. Included in the response is this very misleading statement.

'In all but a very few cases the authority being investigated complies with the recommendations in the Ombudsman’s report where maladministration is determined. Indeed, for 2006-2007 and 2007-2008 there has been a 100% compliance rate. '

However, this is totally untrue and it's so easy to prove because Wilma's own case was determined during this period and Trafford did not comply and have still not complied.

The question is, did the LGO mislead the Government? If you think about it they must have because the only way the Government would know what their compliance figures were was to ask the LGO. Why are the LGO feeding false statistics to the Government? No doubt they don't want the Government to know the truth about the significant number of councils who do not comply with their recommendations.

If the LGO didn't mislead the Government, then why have they not been in touch with the Government to ask them to correct the obvious errors in their response to Wilma's petition?

PS There were other recommendations during 2006 to 2008 that were not complied with, here is another example. As far as the Ombudsman who dealt with Wilma's case is concerned there have been a significant number of councils ignoring her reports and recommendations over the last few years. Wilma's case is not the isolated incident that they would have the public believe.

Let's see if we can get to the truth behind the misleading assertion.

My second post on the subject. (reproduced below)

Further to my earlier post on the subject I have now received a response from the Prime Minister's Office about their misleading response to Wilma Wright's petition. You can read their full response here.

The bottom line is that the Prime Minister's Office is now blaming the Department for Communities and Local Government for providing the flawed response. Accordingly I have just submitted a Freedom of Information to the DCLG in order to try and trace the original source of this misleading information.

So we are one step closer to proving that the LGO was the source of the misleading information.

Update.

'I am writing to advise you that the information held by Communities and Local Government (CLG) is that the compliance for 2006-2007 and 2007-2008 was 100%, and that this information was supplied to CLG by the LGO. You may wish to contact the Local Government Ombudsman as to the source of the information.'

Read the DCLG response here

Now let's see what the LGO have to say about it! Below is a copy of my recent (3/06/2009) FOI request to the LGO.

The Prime Minister's Office replied to my initial FOI request regarding the petition below.

http://www.number10.gov.uk/Page17883

Their response contained a material inaccuracy.

It includes the statement, for 2006-2007 and 2007-2008 there has been a 100% compliance rate regarding the recommendations made by the LGO.

However, they did suggested that their response was based on information given to them by the DCLG.

http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/er...

As a result I submitted a Freedom of Information request to the DCLG in order to confirm the source of the misleading information.

http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/wr...

I have just received their response and as expected they they clearly state that the LGO supplied the misleading information.

I quote, 'I am writing to advise you that the information held by Communities and Local Government (CLG) is that the compliance for 2006-2007 and 2007-2008 was 100%, and that this information was supplied to CLG by the LGO. You may wish to contact the Local
Government Ombudsman as to the source of the information.'

Therefore I would like a copy of all the documents used by the LGO that led to the production the misleading information sent to the DCLG, a copy of any letters/documents sent to the DCLG by the LGO in an attempt to correct the obvious error and a copy of any meeting notes if this matter was discussed internally by the LGOs or any of their staff.

We should their answer within 20 days.

However, whatever their answer the question remains, why have they not been in touch with the Government and asked them to correct the obvious errors in their response to Wilma's petition?

Recruitment of a replacement Local Government Ombudsman

FAO Scrutiny committee

It has come to my attention that both the position of Local Government Ombudsman and Deputy Chair of the CLAE have been advertised. It would also appear to be the first time that the new scrutiny arrangements are used in relation to this position. You should already be aware that there is considerable disquiet about the appointment of LGO's. Particularly ex Council Chief Executive Officers. You should also be aware of the considerable disquiet from users of the Local Government Ombudsmen.

http://ombudsmanwatch.org/

http://psow.co.uk/

There is something seriously wrong with the Commission for Local Administration when they find and report 100 times less maladministration than the Parliamentary Ombudsman and so many anti LGO websites and blogs exist.

http://lgowatcher.blogspot.com/

http://local-government-ombudsman-lgo.blogspot.com/

I hope new LGOs will no longer be recruited from the ranks of the people they are supposed to investigate. The injustice complainants have had to suffer has gone on long enough, it's time the government sorted out the unfair, biased and totally ineffective administrative justice system in this country. The first step is the recruitment of truly independent Local Government Ombudsmen.

Yours faithfully

Trevor R Nunn

Robbie Powell: Persistently unreasonable Ombudsmen!

The Robbie Powell case blows a huge hole right through the public service and local government ombudsmen’s policy of persistently unreasonable complainants and their policy of believing everyone except the complainant.

Mr & Mrs Powell struggled for over 19 years to get to the truth about their son’s death. Basically a doctor lied and falsified records, which amazingly just like public service and local government ombudsmen; they can do so with impunity.

During Mr Powell’s fight for the truth, using the Data Protection Act, he identified that the Ombudsman concerned had wrongly labelled him ‘vindictive’, ‘an alley cat’, ‘a caveman’ and ‘a bully’. (Unusual language for an ombudsman to use but being uncountable their isn't much a complainant like Mr and Mrs Powell can do about it. Except publish the truth and put further evidence against public service and local government ombudsmen into the public domain.)

However, just like the Balchins he was eventually vindicated. A doctor had lied and falsified records. More worrying though is the fact that they can do so without fear of prosecution and with public service and local government ombudsmen like ours with their ‘believe the authority and vilify the complaint policy’ it is a long and difficult journey to embark upon.

If you are a public service or local government ombudsman who wrongly calls people unreasonably persistently complaints just so you can bury the truth then hang your head in shame.

If you are a complainant struggling with the biased and corrupt administrative justice system in this country always bear in mind that Mr and Mrs Powell and Mr & Mrs Balchin have proven that tenacity, persistence and publicity works.

Don't let our public service and local government ombudsmen get away with it any longer. Publish an account of your dealings with them on line now and show the world what a bunch of biased and unprofessional incompetents they really are!

Seex: Do as I say not as I do!

Anne Seex has recently published a report about Nottingham City Council in which she criticises the council for not following the rules of natural justice. 'The Ombudsman found that this was a breach of ....... and of the rules of natural justice'.

What a bloody joke! As far as natural justice is concerned the Local Government Ombudsmen are the worst offenders of them all. They downright refuse to give a complainant access to the necessary documents for a complainant to effectivelly controvert anything a council asserts. Some complainants are forced to resort to the Freedom of Information Act just to get a copy of the council's response to their complaint.

Amazing what you can get away with when you are unaccountable like the LGO.

The lying LGO

The highway on phase two of the development that a neighbour and I complained about remains unadopted (to date) in spite of the ombudsman's office telling me months ago that all the roads on the development were adopted. And in spite of Pat Thomas the previous LGO telling the council to get the roads adopted without delay in her 1998 report.

Which ever way you look at it the LGO's office lied to me. However, it wasn't the first time and I doubt it will be the last time. Did they do it to try and cover up the fact that the council had not supplied the remedy they had promised Pat Thomas in January 1999? More than likely, the LGO don't like people finding out just how impotent and useless they really are and will do anything to hide the truth. Even lying to the government if my previous post is anything to go by.

Did the LGO mislead the Government? Update.

Further to my earlier post on the subject I have now received a response from the Prime Minister's Office about their misleading response to Wilma Wright's petition. You can read their full response here.

The bottom line is that the Prime Minister's Office is now blaming the Department for Communities and Local Government for providing the flawed response. Accordingly I have just submitted a Freedom of Information to the DCLG in order to try and trace the original source of this misleading information.

So we are one step closer to proving that the LGO was the source of the misleading information.

Anti LGO Blog to Anti LGO Website (update)

Further to my earlier post stage 1 of my plans are now complete. I am now starting stage two which is my personal section of the new resource centre. I would like to thank Ombudsman Watchers Thomas and Ann for their help in developing this new resource centre.

Please consider adding your experience of the corrupt system of administrative justice to the resource centre. Everyone needs to know the truth about Public Services and Local Government Ombudsmen. We want the resource centre to be an antidote to the spin, manipulated statistics and dodgy surveys produced by Public Services and Local Government Ombudsmen.

The Local Government Ombudsmen wrongly suggest that there is a link between complainants who do not obtain a finding of maladministration and dissatisfied complainants. However, this is another misrepresentation of the truth. Gary Powell who started LGO Watch obtained a finding of maladministration and I have had two. Therefore, there must be something seriously wrong with Local Government Ombudsmen if complainants who have successfully achieved a finding of maladministration end up becoming the most vociferous anti ombudsmen people in the country.

The ineffective Local Government Ombudsman!

When I submitted my first complaint in June 1997 I was contacted by the Ombudsman's office to see if I would allow them to add my complaint to two others about the same problem. Two of my new neighbours were also complaining about the unadopted roads on their part of the estate. Since 1997 we have had two LGO investigations. Yet part of the roadway on the estate has, to this day, still not been adopted. During 1998 the then Ombudsman, Pat Thomas, recommended that the council adopts the roads without delay. In 2001, when the roads had still not been adopted (council ignored her recommendations), she craftily avoided the need for a second report by stating that the council were doing everything possible to adopt the road (a bare faced lie because it was patently obvious they weren’t). Two LGO investigations into the matter but many of my neighbours are still living on a road that should have been adopted over 12 years ago and still remains unadopted to this day.

Now that’s what I call ineffective!

With the LGO redress is never around but the injustice keeps going around.

Further evidence against the biased Local Government Ombudsman.

I submitted my first complaint in 1997. Unfortunately the council failed to provide the recommended remedy and the ombudsman did nothing about it. Even failing to write a second report as they should have done in such circumstances.

I submitted a second complaint during 2002. The LGO initially rejected my complaint based on a private telephone conversation with a member of the council staff.

During 2006 I managed to persuade the LGO to comeback on my 2002 complaint. The LGO wrongly rejected many of my complaints during 2008 using deliberately manipulated interpretations of the councils statutory powers and guess what, they dealt with the same person who had misled them during 2002. (Full damning story coming soon. I have been delayed because I have been busy building a new website as a permanent home for my case study.)

During late 2008 whilst supposedly providing a remedy for the earlier maladministration the council committed further and more serious acts of maladministration. As I had done in 1997 I copied letters about the councils actions to the LGO.

As usual the LGO ignored the fact that the council were trying to maladminister their way out of the problem they had previously maladministered their way into. However, this last week there was another development, the LGO has asked me if I want to submit a complaint about the council's recent actions.

So we are now in the position that the council has still not met the recommendations of the LGO's 1998 report, the current LGO has ignored this and also buried further acts of maladministration carried out during 2001 but now has the audacity to suggest I give them the chance to bury the further and more serious acts of maladministration committed by the council during 2008.

Are they barking mad?

PS: I suggest the LGO should use the logo above because it graphically represents their organisation better than words could ever do.

Did the LGO mislead the Government?

A few months ago Wilma Wright submitted a petition because Trafford Council refused to accept the York Ombudsman's recommendations.

The Government have recently responded to Wilma's petition. Included in the response is this very misleading statement.

'In all but a very few cases the authority being investigated complies with the recommendations in the Ombudsman’s report where maladministration is determined. Indeed, for 2006-2007 and 2007-2008 there has been a 100% compliance rate. '

However, this is totally untrue and it's so easy to prove because Wilma's own case was determined during this period and Trafford did not comply and have still not complied.

The question is, did the LGO mislead the Government? If you think about it they must have because the only way the Government would know what their compliance figures were was to ask the LGO. Why are the LGO feeding false statistics to the Government? No doubt they don't want the Government to know the truth about the significant number of councils who do not comply with their recommendations.

If the LGO didn't mislead the Government, then why have they not been in touch with the Government to ask them to correct the obvious errors in their response to Wilma's petition?

PS There were other recommendations during 2006 to 2008 that were not complied with, here is another example. As far as the Ombudsman who dealt with Wilma's case is concerned there have been a significant number of councils ignoring her reports and recommendations over the last few years. Wilma's case is not the isolated incident that they would have the public believe.

Let's see if we can get to the truth behind the misleading assertion.

Anti LGO Blog to Anti LGO Website

Blogs are a very useful tool but in some cases they are not the appropriate mechanism for what you want to do. They are excellent for random posts but not very good as a means of archiving evidence and such like. Therefore, I have decided to build a website to house the vast amount of evidence I have collected against the LGO over the last 12 years. Luckily I have now retired so I can dedicate more of my time to my new enterprise. Having said that this blog will continue along side my new website as a means of posting random thoughts.

The LGO was given a chance to do their job properly (twice); they didn't (twice), so now they pay the price. Public exposure and humiliation like they have never experienced before.

An example of the corrupt system of administrative justice system we have in this country. (2)

Further to my earlier post on the subject.

I am slowly wading through the documents and letters that the Council and the LGO exchanged (without my knowledge) during the investigation into my complaint (naughty). However, one common theme runs through all the communacation between the council and the LGO's office. Whilst every letter sent to me during the investigation was very formal in nature, all the letters between the Council and the LGO were very informal and overly friendly in nature. Now one could understand this if both parties knew each other and had a close working relationship but in many cases this was not the case. In one example the LGO investigator did not even know and had not even met one of the people she was communicating with but the letters between the two were still very informal and overly friendly in nature. What impression does this give? Can you image having complained to the Police about a theft, then finding out that they had discussed the issue with the perpetrator in a very friendly and informal manner whilst at the same time dealing with you in a very formal and unfriendly manner before finding no evidence of any wrongdoing on the part of the perpetrator!

Example 2: The LGO may advertise te fact that they are imartial, they may even think they are impartial, but the impression they give is one of NOT being impartial.

An example of the corrupt system of administrative justice system we have in this country. (1)

Background: During the investigation into my complaint the investigator and Ombudsman promised to send me a copy of the evidence that they would be taking into account when reaching a decision regarding my complaint. They never did!!

Following publication of their provisional report I submitted a formal FOI request for a copy of all communications between the council and the LGO. This, as usual, was refused using their standard FOI exemption clause. [Note: In a proper and open system of administrative justice both sides would be shown all the evidence and given the opportunity to controvert it.] The issue was quite clear; the investigator had kept the council in the evidence loop but not me.

In an attempt to obtain a copy of the council's defence to my complaint, something that an open and honest system of justice would ensure happened at the outset, I submitted a Data Protection and Freedom of Information request to the council. Like the LGO, they also turned down my request. However, they don't have the same statutory exceptions as the LGO so I submitted a complaint to the Information Commissioner. Recently the Information Commissioner told them to reconsider their refusal to give me the information requested. As a result of this final warning the council relented and sent me the information.

Example 1: The LGO produced their final report into my complaint during August 2008, 6 months after they had refused to give me the information (March 2008) and 6 months before I managed to obtain it from the council (March 2009). This is information I should have been given before the LGO concluded their investigation not 6 months after.

The LGO always believe the council. Update 1.

Further to my recent post LGO always believe the Council

It has taken me longer to extract the information than anticipated. However, up to now only one council out of the hundreds that have already replied has admitted that a member of their staff has been criticised by the LGO. In this case a member of staff had merely removed a few hand written anotations on a letter and didn't even get a slap on the wrist. The LGO just told them not to do it again.

Up to now the majority of councils have all stated the same. 'On no occasion in the last five years has the Local Government Ombudsman suggested that any member of staff has lied to or misled them.'

Unfortunately a few are trying to avoid giving the information on the grounds that it would be too costly to extract the information. I have initiated a few internal reviews and up to now submitted a couple of compaints to the Information Commissioner others.

I am surprised at the number of councils unaware of their legal responsibilities when it comes to Freedom of Information requests.

Over the last five years the LGO will have received over 80,000 complaints. The majority of which are complaints against one of the 400 or so Councils in England. Yet not one of these complaints led to the LGO criticising a council member of staff for lying or misleading them during an investigation. I call that a statistical impossiblity.

Quote about the LGO

Local Government Ombudsmen have raised administrative justice to a new low.

Submitted by a supporter.

The LGO always believe the council.

I recently submitted a freedom of information request to the Local Government Ombudsman to confirm something that I was told by an investigator and an assistant ombudsman a couple of years ago. As I predicted I didn't obtain the information from the Local Government Ombudsman so I decided to get the information from all the councils instead. I am currently working my way through the list of councils from Adur District Council to Wyre Forest District Council asking the same question using the most excellent What Do They Know? web site.

'During the last five years how many times has the Local Government Ombudsman (as a result of investigating a complaint against Adur District Council) brought to the attention of the council the fact that a member of Adur District Council staff had misled them, lied to them or done anything else to hinder their investigation. If they have what disciplinary action was taken against the individual(s) concerned by the council.'

Up to now the responses have been similar to the one given by Adur District Council, the first council I submitted the request to.

'On no occasion in the last five years has the Local Government Ombudsman suggested that any member of staff has lied to or misled them.'

The responses will support my contention that the LGO will always (unless they can't avoid it, which is extremely rare) believe staff working for the council you are complaining about even if you have rock solid evidence that they have lied or misled the Ombudsman.

The only way a council is ever found guilty of maladministration by a Local Government Ombudsman is if the local authority staff concerned actually confesses to or admit their wrongdoings. When I have finished my task and collated all the responses I will post the results and prove once and for all that the Local Government Ombudsmen are not as impartial as they would like you to think.

The Balchin's case illustrates that the Local Government Ombudsman has been using this 'just accept what council staff tell you without validation' policy for at least twenty years. They also used it on me in 2002 and they are still using it today. When Mr and Mrs Balchin first complained some twenty years ago, the LGO at the time just rang the council concerned, accepted what they were told by the CEO, and refused to investigate their complaint. Years later it was proven that the council had in fact been guilty of maladministration and had misled the Local Government Ombudsman. The Balchins eventually received £100,000 compensation from the council concerned.

When I submitted a complaint in 2002 an Assistant Ombudsman just rang up the council concerned and accepted what they were told by a council Solicitor and refused to investigate my complaint. They even argued that there was nothing wrong with that approach. Tell that to people like the Balchins and Baby P (see below).

The Baby P case illustrates that this is a common problem among all 'so called' watchdogs. Remember Haringey received good reviews from Ofsted before the death of Baby P. After the inquiry it was identified that Ofsted had just used information supplied by Haringey without any form of validation. When Ofsted eventually did their job properly, and validated the information supplied, they re-evaluated and downgraded their later assesment of Haringey.

LGOs: Bigots, fools or slaves?

He who will not reason is a bigot; he who cannot is a fool; and he who dares not is a slave.

Sir William Drummond

New Year Resolution

If anyone is stuck for a New Year Resolution may I suggest a few possibilities,

1) never submit a complaint to the discredited Local Government Ombudsmen.

2) do everything in your power to bring an end to the corrupt system of administrative justice currently operating in this country.

3) sign every petition that involves the discredited LGO. This one is about their involvement with Haringey.

4) do everything you can to expose the LGO for what they are, a bunch of biased ex council amateurs who do nothing more than peddle false hope whilst they bury maladministration for their friends and ex colleagues.

5) if you prefer to be a passive supporter then just let us know and we will add your name to our supporters list.

6) spread the word, tell your friends and family the truth about the discredited LGO.

Together we can make 2009 a year the LGO will never forget.

12 Years of LGO involvement: A festive verse.

During their twelve years of involvement,
the LGO gave to me
Twelve blatant lies,
Eleven perverse reasons,
Ten stupid excuses,
Nine devious tactics,
Eight reasons for delay,
Seven misdirections,
Seex new laws,
Five false hopes,
Four offers to settle,
Three biased investigators,
Two flawed reports,
And proof that they bury maladministration for a local authority.

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year

I would like to wish all my readers a

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.

Each time we stand up for an ideal, or act to improve the lot of others, or strike out against injustice, we send forth a tiny ripple of hope, and crossing each other from a million different centres of energy and daring, those ripples build a current that can sweep down the mightiest walls of oppression and resistance. - Robert Kennedy (7 June, 1966)

What came first the chicken or the stupid excuse?

When Cheshire County Council bodged the unadopted highway in the vicinity of my property I naturally submitted a complaint to the planning enforcement section at Vale Royal Borough Council because the work being carried out was in breach of planning permission. Vale Royal Borough Council's response provides a typical example of the perverse logic used by Councils and Local Government Ombudsmen when faced with a complaint they can't logically answer.

Vale Royal Borough Council state that the highway in question is an adopted highway and as such Cheshire Highways do not require planning permission. Then they go on to say that consequently this authority have no powers to act in this matter.

Whilst their first statement is true it's wholly irrelevant because at the material time of the planning breach the highway in question was not an adopted highway. In fact Cheshire Highways only bodged the road because they desperatly wanted to adopt it without completing the road in line with pre existing planning permission.

So what came first, the breach of planning permission or the adopted highway?

With the LGO justice is never seen to be done!

In an article in the Times headlined Access all areas’ for media so justice is seen to be done there are some interesting comments from Jack Straw.

Mr Straw said yesterday: “My view is that public confidence depends crucially on the system being as open as possible – so the case for restrictions has to be a very strong one.”

A really important veil is being lifted on what happens in these courts,” he said.

Unfortunately the discredited Local Government Ombudsmen still operate like a court of star chamber denying even the most basic of rights such as natural justice and the right to cross examine, let alone allowing justice to be seen to be done. His comments do, however, explain why the Local Government Ombudsmen do not have the public's confidence and never will until they change their ways.

So come on Mr Straw, if you really believe that justice should be seen to be done why don't you also ensure that the administrative justice system in this country also operates in an open and honest way.

In most cases the Local Government Ombudsman even denies the complainant the right to see the evidence they base their perverse conclusions on. And I can vouch for that because that's exactly what happened in my case. As a result of never being allowed to see the council's defence to my complaints (or any other evidence conjured up by the LGO), I never had the opportunity to properly controvert anything they may, or may not have, used as evidence. It's a sad fact of life that the system of administrative justice in England is corrupt and just like the family courts needs a radical overall if they ever expect to gain the public's confidence.

Mr Straw, how an earth can a secretive and unfair system of administrative justice, controlled by a bunch of ex local authority amateurs, ever gain the confidence and respect of the general public? At least the family courts were run by proper judges.

Seex' Law 6

Seex' sixth law: Avoid the concrete conclusion and cultivate the delightfully vague.

A review of Seex' earlier laws.

Seex's fourth law: When the going gets tough, make yourself scarce. Seex's fifth law: When you're unaccountable you can ignore normal things like fairness, natural justice and the truth. Seex' third law: If a particular piece of evidence doesn't fit your preferred conclusion just ignore it. (Even if it's a promise to another ombudsman.) Seex' second law: A Council can infringe a citizen's legal or human rights rights and deny them the right to challenge any interference by the simple ruse of refusing to tell the citizen concerned which statutory authority (law) they are relying on to legitimise their actions. Seex' first law: Further to my earlier post it appears that Mrs Seex has introduced a new legal excuse for a threat. Cheshire County Council have given me a choice of A or B with the threat of C [1] should I refuse to accept A or B. However, the York LGO, Anne Seex, doesn't accept it's a threat, as far as she is concerned Cheshire County Council are merely informing me of what they are going to do should I refuse to accept A or B. Therefore, if you are ever accused of threatening behaviour just use Seex' law as your defence. For example, 'I didn't threaten to hit the person who wouldn't give me their wallet, I was merely informing them of what I was going to do if they didn't give it to me.'

1) The Council refused to tell me what statutory authority allowed them to implement option C. Over the last 8 years the Council has also been refusing to tell me what statutory authority allowed them to implement the plan which was the subject of my complaint. The Ombudsman may find it convenient to turn a blind eye to their refusal to give me the information requested but I certainly don't. Please refer to Seex' second law for further information.

Slowly slowly catchy LGO.

Never trust a Local Government Ombudsman to look after your legal or human rights.

Fact: A Local Government Ombudsman can and often does find a a council not guilty of maladministration even though they are guilty of infringing your legal and/or human rights. With the courts this situation could never happen because unlike a Local Government Ombudsman they have to take your legal and human rights into account. A situation which after 11 years I am about to be able to prove thanks to Cheshire County Council. And once I have the York LGO will have some very, very, serious questions to answer!

Council logic: The cost/benefit ratio.

A recent Freedom of information request highlights an interesting issue.

The Local Government Ombudsman issued a report against Haringey council finding maladministration causing injustice (06/A/12508). The Ombudsman recommended that Haringey should make a payment of about £250 to the complainant.

The report also identified that Haringey made use of external legal advisers in relation to the LGO investigation. The cost to Haringey council, or more precisely, the cost to Haringey council tax payers was £8000 + Vat.

What a waste of taxpayers money. If Haringey had apologised and settled for a few hundred pounds they could have saved £9,400 plus all their own internal costs. In addition the LGO's could have saves the taxpayer the thousands of pound it costs to produce a report. The LGO cost the taxpayer about £12 million year and they produce about 125 reports. That works out at £96,000 per report.

To put everything in context Haringey's attempt to save a few hundred pounds following an act of maladministration cost the taxpayer, one way or another, over £100,000. Multiply that by all the councils in the country and literally £millions must be wasted every year by Councils trying to evade paying out a few hundred pounds each in compensation.

Cheshire County Council is another example, they have spent thousands more on trying to avoid the consequences of maladministration than it would have cost them to amicably resolve the situation. However, the key reason behind doing this is that spending thousands on external legal advice allows a council concerned to block or seriously derail an LGO investigation.

Using external legal advice allows the council to move the issue from 'one of fault in procedure' (maladministration which the LGO can investigate) to 'one of merit' (which the LGO can't investigate). This may be an expensive and dubious tactic to use but it nicely excludes the LGO from getting too involved in anything the council doesn't want them to get involved in.

What makes this tactic even more interesting is that by law any legal advice the council receives is classed as privileged information so the council involved doesn't even have to show the LGO, or anyone else, the advice they received. The bottom line being that a council can hide behind legally privileged information and lie to the LGO and there is damn all the LGO can do about it.

If the council say they took legal advice (even if the legal advice didn't support their position) the LGO is history because the issue is has been moved from an argument about procedure to one of merit.

Unfortunately, the LGO realise that they can't let the complainant in on the trick because it will just expose the stupidity of the whole situation. Therefore, the LGO tend to hide the problem by finding the council guilty of a trivial act of maladministration, such as delay, whilst finding them not guilty of any issue they have managed to 'avoid' using the devious and dubious tactic outlined above.

Time has told (2)

Proof the York LGO's office is willing to lie to a complainant. This last week Cheshire County Council adopted the highways on phase one of the development, which is strange because the York LGO's office told me, apart from a small stretch in the vicinity of my property, they were adopted months ago.

Time has told (1)

My initial complaint to the York LGO in 1997 consisted of 3 specific complaints. However, one of them was totally ignored by the York LGO without explanation. So although I submitted 3 complaints, her final report produced in 1998 only dealt with 2 of them. I complained to the York LGO about the fact she had ignored one of my complaint but never received a satisfactory answer. However, I now know why. The complaint that the York LGO ignored over 11 years ago was about the council bodging the highway to overcome their self created difficulties and that is exactly what they have just done.

Essentially the complaint ignored by the York LGO during 1997/8 was that the council may, as highway authority, reduce the standards of the planned highway to a much lower level than they would allow any developer ever to do so in order to get themselves out of their self created difficulties on the cheap.

Between 1997 and 2008 the council, as highway authority, tried (but failed) to stick me with their problem, as the developer had done between 1991 and 1997. However, the council as highway authority had one major advantage over the developer, they decide the adoption standards of roads in this area so they can bodge the road as much as they want, adopt it and maintain it's been constructed to adoptable standards. When in reality all they have done is reduce the standards to get themselves out of their self created difficulties.

I suggested to the York LGO during 1997 that either another council or an independant body should scrutinise any redesign of the highway to ensure that the council did not take the easy way out and bodge the highway.

Taking all the facts into account the only conclusion I can reach is that the York LGO knew that the council, should they fail to stick me with their problem, may decide to bodge their way out of the problem and left them an escape route. One that for the safety of the general public she should have closed 11 years ago.

This blog will continue to highlight the problems with the York LGO whilst my new blog will highlight the damage that can be done when the York LGO fails to do their job.

A new petition that involves the discredited LGO.

'We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to Investigate LGO Investigations into Child Protection in Haringey. The Country is shocked by the awful situation of Haringey Council and Baby 'P'. Since the Victoria Climbie affair, one hundred and fifteen (115) complaints have been made to the Local Government Ombudsman about child protection in Haringey Council. Only one (1) of these complaints has been upheld with a finding of 'maladministration with injustice' with a paltry settlement of £70. This outcome is a statistical impossibility and exposes the inadequacy of Administrative Justice within the UK. An independent judicial review is requested into these matters'

Please click here to sign the petition. To read the story that inspired the petition click here. To discuss this issue on the LGO watchers public forum click here. To view my own Freedom of Information request click here.

A bodge by any other name.

Today Cheshire County Council bodged the highway in the vicinity of my property. As a result I am now splitting this blog into two. This one will continue to highlight the corrupt system of administrative justice in this country whilst my new blog will highlight all the faults with the highway in the vicinity of my property.

People who use the highway should not be put at extra and unnecessary risk of accident, injury or death due to a substandard highway just so the council can save themselves from the consequences of their self created difficulties.

Honesty goes down the drain.

When Cheshire County Council first sent me their latest plan view of the works they intended to carry out in the vicinity of my property, even without the aid of a cross sectional plan, I immediately identified a serious design flaw. The plan showed that the surface water on some 40 feet of footway would drain onto my land. A major no-no by any stretch of the imagination.

I wrote to the council about my concerns only to be told that surface water from the footway would not drain onto my land because it would percolate into permeable material before reaching my land. However, their own plan showed no such permeable material or drains. Therefore, someone at Cheshire County Council was lying. Evidenced by the fact that when they arrived today to carry out the work across my vehicle access, one of the first things they did was to fit a drainage channel to the back edge of the footway. The only question remaining about the surface water is where does the afterthought and unplanned for drainage channel actually drain the surface water to, and is it adequate for the purpose? No doubt time and, if necessary, a dye test will tell.

Now I am not too concerned about Cheshire County Council staff lying to me because it is something they have been doing that for years, however, I am concerned that if I managed to identify a serious design flaw using nothing more than the plan view think how many more I may have been able to identify using the cross sectional view they still refuse to give me.

And that folks is why Cheshire County Council don't want, and have never wanted to, give me a copy of the cross sectional plans. They know I will be able to identify further serious design flaws with the works.

More than one way to skin a malicious 'Cheshire County Council' cat

After 11 years and 2 York LGO investigations Cheshire County Council are still refusing to provide a proper scaled and detailed cross sectional plan for works they intend to carry out in the vicinity of my property. That denies me the right to confirm the full impact of their works on my property rights and, if necessary, legally challenge them before the works are implemented. That, I am sure a judge will agree, is a malicious attempt to deny me my human rights to justice.

However, there is more than one way to skin a malicious 'Cheshire County Council' Cat. All I need to do is wait for the works to be completed. Then I can have the works surveyed and ask my own surveyor to reverse engineer a scaled cross sectional plan. That will enable me to identify any and all infringements with my property, legal and human rights together with any deviation from normal highway design guidance and take the appropriate action.

In addition, whilst I wait for my surveyor to produce a cross sectional plan I will be able to log and photograph every occasion in which I or my visitors have difficulty accessing and egressing my property, every occasion that surface water enters my property and every occasion that pedestrians have to walk in the road because they feel it's too dangerous to use the vehicular crossing.

Add Cheshire County Council's failure to provide a proper cross sectional plan to the fact that they have also removed the surface water drainage from their recent plan so surface water from the footway will flow onto my land (all previous plans produced by Cheshire County Council had surface water drainage) and I am sure I will have no trouble at all convincing a judge that their actions were done with malicious intent. That should significantly increase the amount of damages I am eventually awarded. Particularly since they could have resolved the situation amicably rather than resorting to oppressively carrying out the works with total disregard to highway & pedestrian safety and my property & human rights.

York LGO: is their irrationality caused by surface water (on the brain)?

Recently a new law was introduced to stop people draining surface water from their land onto a public highway. So why does a Cheshire County Council highway authority engineer think it's acceptable to allow surface water from part of a public highway, the footway, to flow onto my land without my permission? Especially since other Councils state that every step should be taken to ensure that surface water does not flow into private property from the highway as a result of the construction of a crossover.

Whilst the York LGO was involved with my complaint Cheshire County Council's plans included drains for the surface water but after she declared herself functus officio (That's Latin for sticking her head up her backside so she can no longer be blamed for the ongoing council maladministration she failed to resolve.) Cheshire County Council drew a new plan without surface water drains. Did Cheshire County Council remove the surface water drains out of malice because I wouldn't accept a ramp on my land to get them out of their self created difficulties?

Ironically the York LGO ended their involvement with my 1997 complaint because the highway authority promised her the highway would be completed without any impact on my property. I fail to see how draining a public footway onto my property fulfils that promise, but there again, thankfully, I don't have the illogical and perverse brain of a Local Government Ombudsman. Neither do I stick my head up my backside so I don't see Council maladministration causing injustice!

LGO V Courts

An example of why it's always better to use the courts rather than attempt to use the discredited Local Government Ombudsman.

'A local authority has been ordered to pay more than £70,000 compensation to villagers whose early mornings have been made intolerable by the din of refuse trucks.

East Lindsey District Council in Lincolnshire also faces a massive legal costs bill following the High Court victory won by 71-year-old William Bontoft and two of his neighbours in the village of Manby, near Louth.

Judge John Leighton Williams QC, sitting in London, ruled today that the residents could not reasonably have been expected to bear the noise nuisance caused by more than 20 refuse trucks passing their homes at 6.30am.'

If they had taken their complaint to the Local Government Ombudsman they would have been lucky to get a finding of maladministration and a paltry few pounds compensation [1]. In this case a judge agreed there was an actionable nuisance and awarded the three complainants a total of £70,000.

So kick the waste of space LGO into touch and use the courts to protect yourself against councils. You know it makes sense.

[1] The chance of obtaining a finding of maladministration using the Local Government Ombudsman is 0.68%, that's 1 complaint in every 147 complaints submitted. The average compensation obtained through the Local Government Ombudsman is about £650.

11 years, two York LGOs and still no cross sectional plan or statutory authority provided.

Cheshire County Council recently sent me their latest plan view for the works they threaten to carry out in the vicinity of my property but still haven't given me a proper cross sectional view of their plans to prove they won't interfere with my legal and human rights. All they have provided is a not to scale sketch without levels making it a complete waste of time. They argue the works won't interfere with my rights but refuse to prove it by providing a proper cross sectional plan. On one hand they suggest I should seek advice on their plans but on the other refuse to give me a copy of the cross sectional plans on which to do so! The York LGO has a lot to answer for.

I also asked the council to provide me with the specific statutory authority that allowed them to carry out works if they interfered with my legal and human rights. Again they refused.

So after 11 years and 2 Local Government Ombudsman's investigations (1997/98 - 2002/08) I am still waiting for the council to provide a copy of the cross sectional plans for the works they threaten to carry out and/or the statutory authority that allows them to carry out the works if they interfere with my legal and human rights.

And the Local Government Ombudsman has the audacity to wonder why I and many others think they are a complete waste of time!

None standard highway design and the risks involved for a Highway Authority

Cheshire County Council have recently produced yet another plan to complete the highway in the vicinity of my property.

Essentially they have now decided to minimise any impact on my property by bodging the highway footway further to well below normal highway design standards and ignore the need for adequate and proper drainage. Whilst this is excellent news for me regarding my right of way, the news is not so good for future highway users, particularly pedestrians. In essence all they have done is exchange one legal issue, my right of way, with others, actionable nuisance caused by flooding of my land due to their failure to provide adequate and proper drainage and claims by highway users should they injure themselves as a result of their none standard and dangerous design. Ironically, they have also opened the door for 'no win no fee' brigade to take them to the cleaners should anyone fall on the footway in the vicinity of my property.

I submitted a Freedom of Information request for a copy of the risk assessment they carried out because their design deviated from normal design practice only to be told by their solicitor that the roadway was designed within guidelines (using their own guidelines it is demonstrably not) and as such they didn't need to carry out a risk assessment (music to the ears of 'no win no fee solicitors'). Particularly when I tell a claimants solicitor that I would have accepted compensation or sold the Council the land necessary for them to complete the roadway to safe and normal adopted road standards. However, rather than accepting my gracious offer they chose to put peoples lives at risk and save the money it would cost doing the job properly.

You can view the Practical Guide to Appendix C of The Roads Board report "Well Maintained Highways - Code of Practice for Highway Maintenance Management" by clicking here.

I have extracted part of the document below and highlighted the relevant parts in blue.

4.1.3 Providing a defence for new works

Similar principles will be used in providing a defence. A local authority will need to provide evidence that:

• new works were safe and properly designed, and did not inadvertently trap road users into danger.

• a local authority may wish to cite in evidence that the works complied with appropriate standards or design guidance or according to principles that have been properly applied.

4.1.4 A system to manage risks

The local authority should operate a system that enables risks to be identified, assessed, and appropriately managed, with a record kept at each stage.

Local authority departments must cooperate in the introduction of risk assessment systems for all highways associated functions. Systems will need to identify areas of high claims experience and instigate lines of investigation to reduce the extent of potential claims.

Simply sitting back and hoping the problem will go away, or not happen, is a recipe for disaster. There needs to be a "culture" change in most organisations for both members and officers if everyone is to be aware of risk management. It is likely to be difficult to demonstrate that criteria for highways management or design are objective, where they have been influenced by short term political needs.

Information from the system should be communicated within and outside the local authority.

Interesting times ahead if someone is badly injured or killed as a result of their dangerous design. Especially since it was only done to get themselves out of their self created difficulties on the cheap. Their own solicitor's words not mine! Even worse for the York LGO because she stated that she was happy with what they are doing. Talk about putting your head on the block for your friends! If a child gets killed on the highway in the vicinity of my property we will have another Haringey. I warned Cheshire County Council and I warned the LGO neither would listen so on their heads be it.

In March 2005 Government published a draft Corporate Manslaughter Bill. The bill would introduce a new, specific offence of corporate manslaughter. An organisation would be prosecuted for this if a gross failing by its senior managers to take reasonable care for the safety of their workers or members of the public caused a person’s death. There have been some concerns that Highway Authorities may be liable under Corporate Manslaughter if it is found that a defect in design has resulted in death, and that this may stifle innovation in street design. The Government is alert to this issue and does not want to give design guidance the status of mandatory requirement by introducing the offence of Corporate Manslaughter. Authorities will need to show that they have carried out a risk assessment if departing from guidance, however. Again this points to the need for a documented and balanced design sign-off system that allows for authorities to move beyond normal design standards when appropriate. Cheshire County Council have not done that so it looks as though a Corporate Manslaughter charge against Cheshire County Council could be brought should anyone die as a result of their stupid and dangerous design.

Haringey: The Role and Ineffectiveness of the LGO

'SOCIAL workers in Haringey have been the subject of 115 complaints to the local government watchdog in the years since the death of Victoria Climbié......The local government ombudsman dealt with the stream of complaints amid claims of serious failings by the council since 2000.....The ombudsman said that, of the 115 complaints it deal with, there was a finding in one case of maladministration causing injustice.'

Read the full story here.

How many more children have to die? How many more people have to suffer injustice as a result of council maladministration before the LGO wake up and do their job. They are supposed to investigate complaints not bury them for their friends and ex colleges in councils.

The deaths through council maladministration has to stop and the injustice through council maladministration has to stop! And if the LGO prefer to ignore the problem then the government need to sack them and get a really independent body to act as a watchdog.

Here's another example from Manchester.

Ironically one of the Local Government Ombudsmen used to work for Haringey and another for Manchester. Could the problem be that all Local Government Ombudsmen are ex council chief executives making them what most members of the public would refer to as part of 'the old boys network'.

To read about some of the other cases that happened after the Victoria Climbié case but before the latest cases click here.

Another website exposing more council cock ups.

'Without any notice to the affected residents, Wakefield Planning Department allowed South Yorkshre Housing Association (SYHA) to submit plans for a 3 storey "Super Home"; the largest residential building in Normanton, after only allowing residents to see outline plans for bungalows abutting their properties'...Please click here to visit the website.

Brent Council and the LGO

Yet another blogger exposing a corrupt council and the 'incompetent' Local Government Ombudsman providing even more evidence of the LGO's predisposition to believe anything a council tells them in spite of overwhelming evidence to the contrary.

Please click here to visit the Bent Council blog or use the link in the side bar.

The truth is out there!

'Where it is found that maladministration has occurred, the ombudsman produces a report recommending the sorts of remedy that the authority concerned might want to pursue.' [My emphasis]

The reason they do this is that councils can and do ignore them with impunity so if they don't suck up to councils and offer a solution that a Council is happy with nothing will be resolved and the Ombudsman just looks impotent.

Would Local Government Ombudsmen ever admit to only recommending the sorts of remedies that the authority concerned might want to pursue... after all this does give the game away. Well yes they would because the statement above was made in a recruitment advert that secured the services of the current York LGO.

The following statement was also made in the recruitment advert 'In most cases, the council will have to stump up a formal apology and a few hundred quid in compensation.'

Time has told.

During a November 2006 post I reiterated an earlier comment

'Only time will tell but it's not looking good so far. They [The LGO] appear more interested in resolving the problem for the County Council than investigating my complaint. Two months and they still haven't asked the Council for a formal response to the allegations I made during 2002.'

The York LGO published her report some three months ago [August 2008] but I still haven't seen a copy of Cheshire County Council's defence to my complaint or a copy of the plans I complained about let alone be given the chance to controvert them. If that's what the York LGO considers justice God help us all. More like arse covering for their failure to persuade the councils to fulfil their 1999 promise to complete the works without any impact on my property.

Quote

Any report that requires the suspension of reason as a necessity for acceptance is a bad report.

Last chance to sign Wilma Wright's petition.

Only a few days left in which to sign Wilma Wright's petition. Please help Carly's family to get the justice they deserve. Sign her mother's petition now!

The LGO: A legal way to pervert the course of justice?

Although most people are aware that Local Government Ombudsmen can't determine a complainants legal and human rights (only a court can do that) many people don't actually realise that Local Government Ombudsmen don't even attempt to identify any legal or human rights issues involved in their complaint let alone do anything about them during the course of an investigation.

This can lead to frightening miscarriages of justice for those complainants who are unaware of this critical fact. Many complaints, as mine does, consists of more than just simple maladministration, they also include potential legal and human rights issues. However, the Local Government Ombudsman only seeks to identify (and then remedy) simple maladministration and overlooks any legal and human rights issues.

Whether the Local Government Ombudsman finds the council guilty of a maladministration or not is irrelevant. The problem is that most complaints naively accept a Local Government Ombudsman's findings as final and, one way or another, an the end of their complaint. They wrongly assume that the Ombudsman has addressed all the issues involved in their complaint. What makes matters worse is that Local Government Ombudsmen do little if anything to advertise the fact that their involvement is concerned only with maladministration. Once the Ombudsman's investigation is over most Councils then use the Ombudsman's report to support their unlawful actions.

Ironically a council is also guilty of maladministration for any infringement of your legal or human rights. However, Local Government Ombudsmen can ignore them with impunity until they have been determined in a court of law.

Therefore, there is a catch 22 situation. A council infringes (or threatens to infringe) your legal or human rights, the Local Government Ombudsman can and does ignore them until they are determined in a court of law. Up to that point, no matter how compelling the evidence, the Local Government Ombudsman can argue they are mere allegations and ignore them. Once determined in a court of law they will of course also become an act of maladministration but once that has been done just what purpose do Local Government Ombudsmn serve?

Fact: With a Local Government Ombudsman a council can be found not guilty of maladministration whilst still remaining (potentially) guilty of infringing your legal and/or human rights. With the courts this situation could never happen because unlike a Local Government Ombudsman they can't ignore your legal and human rights before reaching a decision.

When the LGO state they are an alternative to court they are attempting to con the public. Don't let them con you! If this practice was perpetrated by an individual or private organisation they would be guilty of attempting to pervert the course of justice.

Redress in the round (and round the mulberry bush)

I recently received a letter from the current York LGO informing me that she was satisfied with what Cheshire County Council planned to do next. Whilst I am still unaware of what that is I find the LGO's comments offensive. Particularly since all Cheshire County Council have done up to now is threaten to infringe my legal and human rights. Therefore, is she implying that she is satisfied that Cheshire County Council will complete the works whist infringing my legal or human rights? If not why not tell me what they plan to do next? Just what is the big secret?