The Ombudsman's final decision
Summary: We have upheld this complaint because the Council delayed considering a complaint at stages two and three of the children’s statutory complaints procedure. The Council has now agreed to resolve the complaint apologising and offering to make a payment to the complainant to remedy the time and trouble they have been too.
The complaint
Miss X complains about how the Council’s children’s services dealt with her and her family. Miss X asked the Ombudsman to intervene after her complaint was not escalate to stage three of the statutory children’s complaints procedure.
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 this decision with the Office for Standards in Education, Children’s Services and Skills (Ofsted).
How I considered this complaint
I considered information provided by the complainant 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, where 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.
The statutory guidance says that if a complaint has been accepted at stage one the local authority is obliged to ensure the complaint proceeds to stages two and three if the complainant requests this.
Assessment In September 2022, Miss X escalated her complaint to stage two of the statutory complaints procedure. The Council issued its response in February 2024 and Miss X asked the Council to escalate to stage three shortly after. The Council write to Miss X in June to apologise for the delay in arranging the stage three panel meeting and asked Miss X for any dates she is unable to attend. Miss X has said she can only attend on Mondays. The Council is currently corresponding with Miss X and panel members to secure a date that everyone can make.
If we were to investigate this complaint it is likely we would find the Council at fault. This is because there has been a delay in the Council considering the complaint at stages two and three. This has meant Miss X has been to some significant time and trouble pursuing her complaint. It does now however seem that the complaint is now progressing at the final stage.
We therefore asked the Council to apologise to Miss X for the delay and offer to make a payment to her of £900 to remedy the time and trouble she has been too pursuing her complaint.
To its credit, the Council agreed to resolve the complaint and has agreed with our recommendations which it will complete within one month of the date of this decision.
Final decision
We have upheld this complaint. The Council has agreed to resolve the complaint early by providing an appropriate remedy.
Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman