The Ombudsman's final decision
Summary: We uphold Miss X’s complaint that the Council failed to consider her complaint within its children statutory complaints’ procedure. The Council has agreed to do so without further delay.
The complaint
The complainant, whom I will call Miss X, says the Council failed to pay her the correct financial support as a Special Guardian.
The Ombudsman’s role and powers
We investigate complaints about ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’. In this statement, I have used the word fault to refer to these. We must also consider whether any fault has had an adverse impact on the person making the complaint. I refer to this as ‘injustice’. If there has been fault which has caused an injustice, we may suggest a remedy. (Local Government Act 1974, sections 26(1) and 26A(1), as amended) Under our information sharing agreement, we will share the final decision with the Office for Standards in Education, Children's Services and Skills (Ofsted).
How I considered this complaint
I considered information provided by Miss X and the Council.
I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.
My assessment
The statutory complaints’ procedure The law sets out a three-stage procedure for councils to follow when looking at complaints about children’s social care services. The accompanying statutory guidance, Getting the Best from Complaints, explains councils’ responsibilities in more detail.
The first stage of the procedure is local resolution. Councils have up to 20 working days to respond.
If a complainant is not happy with a council’s stage one response, they can ask that it is considered at stage two. At this stage of the procedure, councils appoint an investigator and an independent person who is responsible for overseeing the investigation. Councils have up to 13 weeks to complete stage two of the process from the date of request.
If a complainant is unhappy with the outcome of the stage two investigation, they can ask for a stage three review by an independent panel. The Council must hold the panel within 30 days of the date of request, and then issue a final response within 20 days of the panel hearing.
What happened The Council replied to Miss X’s complaint at stage one in mid May 2022. The matters she complain of, fall within the Children Act statutory complaints’ procedure. She requested a stage two complaint at the end of May 2022. This should have been completed at the latest by the end of August 2022 but has not.
An investigation is likely to find fault causing the complainant injustice because the Council has not complied with the Children Act statutory complaints’ procedure.
Agreed action
The Council has agreed to complete the Stage Two within 65 working days of my final decision and to explain the rights under the process to Miss X.
Final decision
I uphold this complaint with a finding of fault causing an injustice.
Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman