Knowsley Metropolitan Borough Council (13 000 338)
Summary
Complaint from a woman that the council failed to provide an adequate service for her adult son who has autism with severe learning disability and challenging behaviour.
The complaint
Complaint from a woman that the council failed to provide an adequate service for her adult son who has autism with severe learning disability and challenging behaviour.
Finding
The Ombudsman upheld the complaint and found fault causing injustice.
Recommendations
To remedy the injustice, we recommend the council:
- reviews the man's current community support assessment and support plan in his new placement. The council should ensure both assessment and resulting support plan are sufficiently detailed and comply with government guidelines. A review timetable should be set up to include a further three month review and annual reviews after that. Given the history of the case, the council should be particularly careful to assess whether circumstances require a review at any other point;
- consider whether there are any deprivation of liberty issues arising from the man's current placement and, if so, addresses them according to the Deprivation of Liberty Safeguards Code of Practice;
- reminds its staff of the importance of
- producing support plans;
- carrying out reviews;
- carrying out formal capacity assessments; and
- ensuring their decisions on behalf of people lacking capacity are clearly made in those people's best interests.
The council should provide evidence to us within three months of the final report that these reminders have been carried out.
- make a payment of £500 to the man's father to be spent on activities or equipment for him to acknowledge the uncertainty about whether the council's faults caused him avoidable distress; and
- pays the mother £500 to acknowledge the uncertainty about whether the council's faults caused her avoidable distress.
Ombudsman satisfied with council's response: 26 January 2015