The Ombudsman's final decision
Summary: We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint about children services’ actions. It is unlikely our investigation could achieve significantly more than the Council has already offered.
The complaint
The complainant, whom I shall call Mr X, says the Council’s children services team acted unreasonably and has been dishonest towards him. He says it has failed to properly remedy his complaint.
The Ombudsman’s role and powers
We investigate complaints about ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’, which we call ‘fault’. We must also consider whether any fault has had an adverse impact on the person making the complaint, which we call ‘injustice’. We provide a free service, but must use public money carefully. We do not start or continue an investigation if we decide: we could not add to any previous investigation by the organisation, or further investigation would not lead to a different outcome. (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended) 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 and our Guidance on Remedies.
I considered Mr X’s comments on a draft version of this decision.
My assessment
In February 2021, Mr X complained to the Council about its children services actions. The Council replied using its Children Act 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. At stage two of this procedure, the Council appoints an Investigating Officer and an Independent Person (who is responsible for overseeing the investigation). If a complainant is unhappy with the outcome of the stage two investigation, they can ask for a stage three review. If a council has investigated something under this procedure, we would not normally re-investigate it unless we consider that investigation was flawed. However, we may look at whether a council properly considered the findings and recommendations of the independent investigation.
The Council upheld the majority of Mr X’s complaint and the real crux of it. This meant it accepted that: Its officers did not properly advise him in January 2021 what a ‘section47 investigation’ meant and what that involved.
He had a month without contact with his children and there was no legal basis for the Council to withhold it. The Council failed to tell him who had decided to do so and on what basis.
It had not held a meeting in February 2021 properly.
It had not given Mr X information on how he could access his file.
Mr X also had complaints about the content of a family assessment, a ‘section seven report’, the complaints’ procedure and related issues.
The Council apologised for the identified faults and offered Mr X £2700.
Analysis Mr X applied to Court for it to decide his children care arrangements. As part of those proceedings the Court ordered the Council to provide a report on the family’s circumstances. This is a ‘section seven report’. We cannot investigate its content or its preparation as it forms part court proceedings. We also cannot investigate any report which was the basis of the section seven report, such as a related family assessment report. This means that some of Mr X’s complaint is not something we can consider.
Having considered our remedies guidance, it is unlikely we would achieve a significantly different remedy than the £2700 on offer, plus the internal practice improvements the Council has said it has or will undertake.
Final decision
We will not investigate this complaint. This is because it is unlikely we could achieve significantly more.
Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman