I thank my right hon. Friend the Member for North East Hampshire (Mr Arbuthnot) for giving us this further opportunity to discuss the Bill.
The local government ombudsman is a valued and respected part of the democratic process. The role of the ombudsman is generally to consider complaints from individual members of the public who consider that they have suffered personal injustice arising from the maladministration of the local authority. The remit of the ombudsman extends to district, borough, city and county councils, as well as to certain other authorities such as national park authorities. Their remit does not extend to parish or town councils for good reason, and I shall touch on that in a moment.
Amendment 2 would give the local government ombudsman the power to compel a local authority to pay compensation when it found that the local authority had acted unreasonably to prevent an event from taking place. It states that the compensation shall not exceed the cost of staging the event, so it is essentially a cancellation fee.
I am concerned that the amendment may do more harm than good. The local government ombudsman may not issue binding decisions; instead it makes recommendations to local authorities, which can include the paying of compensation by the local authority to members of the public who have suffered an injustice arising from maladministration. There is almost total compliance with the recommendations of the local government ombudsman, and making recommendations is central to the way that it carries out investigations. Because the process will not result in a binding decision, the starting point between a local authority and the local government ombudsman is not adversarial, which means that the investigation can progress more quickly and comprehensively than might otherwise be the case.
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My other concern is that the amendment would unduly fetter the discretion of the ombudsman. As the Bill is drafted, the ombudsman can recommend the
remedy that it feels appropriate. Capping compensation at the amount it would have cost to stage the event in question may seem reasonable at first glance, particularly if we are talking about taxpayers’ money, but we should be mindful of other potential recipients of compensation, for instance in relation to events that may be staged to raise funds for charity. Such cases may involve community-minded members of the public, companies and others that give their time and resources for free. The cancellation of such an event may not involve great cost to the organiser, but may result in lost donations to the charity in question. The Bill as drafted intends to ensure that local authorities consider carefully their decisions on health and safety at events, meaning that any decision will be proportionate and reflect the right balance of risk.
If there is a problem with the initial decision, the review process is expected to address that at local level, and only if no redress is available would the local government ombudsman become involved. We expect that to be a rare occurrence, but where it does happen, the discretion of the ombudsman in recognising redress should not be fettered. As I said, the ombudsman’s remit does not extend to parish or town councils for two good reasons. The first is a practical one. There are 9,000 such councils in England. Although they do not have the powers of a principal local authority such as a district council, they still decide on local matters and there will, of course, be people who do not agree with those decisions. Tasking the ombudsman with considering complaints about parish councils would mean—if I may understate the challenge—considerably and unnecessarily adding to the work load of that organisation.
The second reason that the ombudsman’s remit does not extend to parish and town councils is that democracy is more immediate and the council more accessible. These are smaller communities than those served by district councils, and if an event organiser does not agree with a decision about their event, they are more likely to be able to take the matter up with the council directly.
My right hon. Friend’s amendment seeks only to extend the remit of the ombudsman to parish councils so far as those local authorities are making decisions about health and safety-related matters at events, but I argue that that is unnecessary, given the accessibility of those councils at local level. I hope that with those reassurances, he will be willing to withdraw his amendment.