Issue - meetings

The Committee heard from the Customer Experience Officer regarding the complaint referrals to the Local Government Ombudsman (LGO) for 2018/19. It was summarised that 20 complaints had been referred to the LGO, the majority of which had been related to planning matters as was normal for Local Authorities, in total six had been upheld. Four had initially been referred in 2016 and 2017 but were complex complaints and the actions had already been implemented. The Customer Experience Officer highlighted that to date, there had only been five complaints referred to the LGO and the one complaint to have been upheld had been referred in the previous year. To date, no complaints referred to the LGO in the current year had been upheld.

A Member of Committee enquired as to how the council communicated with a complainant when the LGO upheld their complaint. It was explained that the final response would be communicated formally in writing but there would usually be verbal communication throughout the process. There was also discussion regarding the issue of maladministration and whether this was the same across all complaints it referred to. It was explained that there were different aspects covered within the one area, such as processes not being followed or procedures being incomplete. It was clarified that if there was an individual officer identified as responsible, their team manager would deal with any resulting actions, however, where there were failings within a procedure, it would be reviewed and amended as necessary. Training would be rolled out to all officers as appropriate and lessons learnt would be built into the working processes.

The Chairman thanked the Customer Experience Officer for a clear and concise report and suggested that, given the changes to the complaints process in the past year, a further audit could be considered in the future.

RESOLVED to welcome the report from the Local Government Ombudsman and acknowledge the work which has been undertaken to incorporate the learning from the report’s findings into how West Lindsey District Council works as an organisation.