The Ombudsman's final decision
Summary: We uphold Mr X’s complaint that the Council has failed to reply to his complaint within its Children Act statutory complaints’ procedure. The Council has agreed to make a payment for the injustice caused by this and to now complete the procedure.
The complaint
The complainant, whom I will call Mr X, says the Council failed to reply to his children services complaint properly.
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).
We cannot investigate a complaint about the start of court action or what happened in court. (Local Government Act 1974, Schedule 5/5A, paragraph 1/3, as amended)
How I considered this complaint
I considered information provided by Mr 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 Mr X complains the Council failed to consider his complaint within its complaints’ procedure. The Council accepted his complaint within its Children Act statutory complaint procedure in August 2021. It replied at Stage One in September 2021. Mr X asked for his complaint to be escalated to Stage Two within days. The Stage Two has not been completed. In July 2022, the Council told Mr X that a new Investigating Officer would need to be appointed and the Stage Two restarted. He was not happy with this.
If we were to investigate it is likely we would find fault causing Mr X injustice because the Council has failed to complete the Stage Two within the Children Act statutory complaint procedure regulations.
Agreed action
The Council has agreed to: Offer to Mr X to complete the Stage Two within 65 working days of the date of my final decision. Should he take that offer up, ensure the Council explains his full rights under the procedure once the Stage Two is completed.
Pay Mr X £150 for the injustice caused by the delayed Stage Two.
Final decision
I uphold this complaint with a finding of fault causing an injustice.
Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman