The Ombudsman's final decision
Summary: We uphold Mrs 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 Mrs X, says the Council has failed to reply properly to her complaint about issues related to her as a foster carer.
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 Mrs 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 Mrs X complained about issues related to her as a foster carer. The Council decided to reply to the complaint within the Children Act statutory complaints procedure and did so at Stage One in January 2021. Mrs X was unhappy with the reply and asked for it to be escalated to Stage Two. After eleven months it had not progressed, and she complained to us. In January 2022, the Council agreed to appoint an investigating officer, initiate a Stage Two within a month and pay Mrs X £300 for the delays so far.
The Council completed Stage Two in July. Mrs X asked for escalation to Stage Three. The Council refused and sort an early referral to us under the process.
An investigation, is likely to find fault causing the complainant injustice because the stage two conclusion was delayed by around four months. And the early referral requirements are not met. Out of ten complaints only one was upheld and Mrs X is seeking a stage three partly because she says the stage two report was not robust. She says it is factually incorrect and the context of her complaint has been lost.
Agreed action
The Council has agreed within 30 workings days of this decision to: Convene a stage three review panel and Pay Mrs X £100 for the delays since January 2022.
Final decision
I uphold this complaint with a finding of fault causing an injustice.
Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman