Investigation of Councils

The request was partially successful.

Dear Local Government Ombudsmen,

How does a complainant know what information the Council sends to the Ombudsman, does the Ombudsman send all letters, forms, emails received from the Council to the complainant.

How many instances have there been where the Council has not sent letters, forms, emails to the Ombudsman which would have proved maladministration and the complainant has had to forward these on to the Ombudsman.

Yours faithfully,

james fisher

Trevor R Nunn left an annotation ()

The LGO does not send copies of everything to the complainant even if they promise to.

The complainant never knows what documents the ombudsman obtains from any source let alone the content.

The only information a complainant is allowed to see is that which supports the Ombudsman position.

Not exactly fair but that's Local Government Ombudsmen for you.

http://lgowatcher.blogspot.com/2008/08/l...

Foi Officer, The Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman

Dear Mr Fisher

Our ref: CS/10/083

This is to acknowledge receipt of your I request below received on 26 July. I will respond within the 20 working day target (which would be by 23 August 2010) or, if unable to do so, I will write to you again explaining why.

Yours sincerely

Hilary Pook
Communications & Records Manager | DL: 020 7217 4734 |
Local Government Ombudsman's office | 10th Floor |
Millbank Tower | Millbank | London | SW1P 4QP |
www.lgo.org.uk |

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Foi Officer, The Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman

1 Attachment

Dear Mr Fisher

I attach a letter in response to your request below.

Yours sincerely

Hilary Pook
Communications & Records Manager | DL: 020 7217 4734 |
Local Government Ombudsman's office | 10th Floor |
Millbank Tower | Millbank | London | SW1P 4QP |
www.lgo.org.uk |

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Trevor R Nunn left an annotation ()

What they do and what they say they do are two different things.

The LGO have investigated two complaints of mine and although initially promising a copy of documents used in their decision making process they have always ended up breaking their promises.

During the last investigation I repeatedly asked for copies of evidence so I could, in line with natural justice, have the chance to validate or controvert it. In spite of their promises all I ever received was a chronology of events.

I used the FOI Act to obtain some information after the LGO had reached their decision only to find what the LGO had used to base their decision on was NOT what they argued it was in their report.

For example. One expert witness, the LGO had supposedly relied on, had no knowledge of ever being contacted by them. No wonder the LGO couldn't give me a copy of the evidence I had asked for and had to rely on nothing more than a chronology of events.

In addition statements made by the council, accepted without validation by the LGO and later reproduced by them as facts in documentation were incorrect.

Although I repeatedly asked them to validate everything many of the so called established facts were based on nothing more than one sided un-validated and uncontested statements. No wonder they prefer to keep complainants in the dark!

For the truth about Local Government Ombudsmen

http://lgowatcher.blogspot.com/