The Ombudsman's final decision
Summary: We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint about the Council’s failure to properly assess risks to his child. This is because the reports prepared were for court hearings, and the Ombudsman cannot investigate matters considered by a court of law.
The complaint
Mr X complained the Council failed to safeguard his son when carrying out risk assessments of the new partner of the child’s mother. He said the reports the Council prepared for the court were inaccurate.
Mr X said the failings caused him extreme worry as he considered his son was at risk of harm.
The Ombudsman’s role and powers
The Local Government Act 1974 sets out our powers but also imposes restrictions on what we can investigate.
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) 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. (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended, section 34(B)) The statutory children’s complaints procedure was set up to provide children, young people and those involved in their welfare with access to an independent, thorough and prompt response to their concerns. Because of this, if a council has investigated something under the statutory children’s complaint process, the Ombudsman would not normally re-investigate it.
How I considered this complaint
I considered information provided by Mr X.
I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.
My assessment
Mr X is concerned about the risks posed to his son, Y. Y lives with his mother and his mother’s new partner, Mr Z. Mr Z has a history of perpetrating domestic abuse. Mr X’s complaints are primarily about the risk assessments carried out by the Council and reports prepared for court action.
We will not investigate this complaint further because we cannot investigate complaints about reports prepared for court action.
In any case, Mr X’s complaints have been investigated using the statutory children’s complaints procedure. Although the Council has not accepted the findings of the Stage 3 panel in full, it has agreed to carry out the panel’s recommendations, which included a review of the case file and further scrutiny of documents presented to the court. Therefore, even if we could investigate some aspects of the complaint, it is unlikely we could add to the previous investigation.
Final decision
We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint because we cannot investigate complaints about reports prepared for court action.
Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman