Summary: Ms X complained about the Council’s failure to provide care and support for her daughter for several months. We found the Council at fault for not meeting her daughter’s assessed needs for this period. The Council has agreed to our recommendations to remedy the injustice caused.

The complaint

1. Ms X complains the Council, between July 2022 and December 2022, failed to provide the 3 hours of weekly care and support for her daughter (“Miss Y”) which it had assessed her as needing. She also complains about the way the Council has handled her complaints as she says it does not respond to her correspondence. Ms X says this caused significant frustration and distress as she had no support during that time to help with her daughter’s needs.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

2. 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 significant injustice, or that could cause injustice to others in the future we may suggest a remedy. (Local Government Act 1974, sections 26(1) and 26A(1), as amended)
3. We may investigate complaints made on behalf of someone else if they have given their consent. (Local Government Act 1974, section 26A(1), as amended)
4. If we are satisfied with an organisation’s actions or proposed actions, we can complete our investigation and issue a decision statement. (Local Government Act 1974, section 30(1B) and 34H(i), as amended)

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How I considered this complaint

5. I discussed the complaint with Ms X (Miss Y’s mother), who is dealing with the complaint on her behalf. I considered her views and the information she sent to me.
6. I made enquiries of the Council and considered its written responses, copies of the case records, and information it provided.
7. Ms X and the Council had an opportunity to comment on my draft decision. I considered any comments received before making a final decision.

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What I found

Law and administrative background

Care and support assessments and plans

8. Sections 9 and 10 of the Care Act 2014 require councils to carry out an assessment for any adult with an appearance of need for care and support. They must provide an assessment to everyone regardless of their finances or whether the council thinks the person has eligible needs. The assessment must be of the adult’s needs and how they impact on their wellbeing and the results they want to achieve. It must also involve the individual and where suitable their carer or any other person they might want involved.
9. If the assessment finds a person has eligible needs, the Council must meet those needs. It is not required to meet any needs being met by a carer.
10. The Care Act 2014 gives councils a legal responsibility to provide a care and support plan. When preparing a care and support plan, the local authority must involve any carer the adult has. The care and support plan should consider what needs the person has, what they want to achieve, what they can do by themselves or with existing support and what care and support may be available in the local area. 

Background

11. Ms X has an adult daughter (“Miss Y”) who has learning difficulties. They have a close relationship and Ms X says she provided a high level of support to Miss Y.
12. In August 2021, the Council assessed Miss Y as needing 3 hours of support per week in her care and support plan. This covered shopping and help attending medical appointments. Ms X disagreed with this as the support had reduced from 16 hours per week.
13. In October 2022, we made a decision on a complaint from Ms X to us about the matter. We did not find fault with how the Council made this decision. We found fault with delay in putting this support in place for Miss Y up until January 2022.
14. The Council says Miss Y has capacity to make decisions about her health and welfare. Ms X has Lasting Power of Attorney for Miss Y’s Property and Finances.

What happened

15. I have summarised below an overview of the key relevant events. This is not intended to be a detailed account of every communication between the parties or an exhaustive chronology of everything that happened. I have outlined relevant case records I have seen.
16. In mid-June 2022, the Council’s social worker emailed Miss Y as it was aware Ms X was recovering from surgery and could not provide her normal support to Miss Y. The social worker gave her some other support options. Miss Y said she did not understand the email as it was too complicated. She did not want further contact from them and wanted another social worker. She said “I do need the help” but said she wanted to sit with Ms X until she was better.
17. In late-June 2022, Miss Y’s care provider (“Agency A”) gave notice, and its support would stop at the end of July. The social worker submitted an internal request to source a new provider. “Agency B” responded asking for more information. Case records show no further logs about this request except the social worker asking Agency B for a phone call.
18. In late July, the social worker emailed Ms X to return a message it received from its Business Support team. She asked Ms X to confirm if she had a new carer to provide support for Miss Y. Ms X promptly replied and asked who would be taking over Miss Y’s care when it ended as she needed help. A week later Ms X chased for a response. The social worker responded she had respected Miss Y’s wish for no further contact and so no provider was in place.
19. The social worker then made an enquiry with Agency B again, asking if it could provide the support. Agency B asked the social worker to help arrange an assessment visit to see Miss Y. Council records do not show the social worker responded to this.
20. In August, Ms X asked the social worker about direct payments, and they sent her some information. She asked Ms X if she still needed the other providers and to confirm if she wanted to proceed with direct payments. Ms X requested to continue with the other providers while she had a think. She said, “care is needed [as soon as possible]”. I cannot see Ms X received a response to this.
21. In-mid September, Ms X sent emails to the Council with her dissatisfaction about Miss Y’s assessments and other related concerns about its actions (not the subject of this investigation). Within these, she mentioned Miss Y still had no support since July. The Council responded about the other matters. Ms X chased up responses as it had not addressed her point about no care hours in place for Miss Y.
22. In November, Ms X’s MP wrote to the Council about her complaint on her behalf. Relevant to this investigation, he said as it was not providing support to Miss Y, Ms X was doing it herself. Ms X had her own health issues, and it was impacting on her physical and mental wellbeing.
23. In December, the Council responded to the MP. It referred to the previous Ombudsman decision made and said the same matters had already been investigated. It would speak to Miss Y for her views.
24. In mid-December, the social worker asked Agency B if it could still provide the support to Miss Y.
25. In late-December, Ms X sent two emails to the Council’s complaints team outlining her complaint about this matter.
26. At the end of December, the Council found Agency C and support for Miss Y started.
27. Ms X said to me she had to provide the care hours to Miss Y herself, and this was during a period when she was recovering from surgery.

Complaint to us

28. In late-December, Ms X complained to us. Before we would accept the complaint, we asked Ms X for evidence it had completed the Council’s complaints process.
29. In January 2023, in response to our enquiries, the Council registered the complaint. It said it sent a Stage One response to Ms X in February.
30. The Council said Ms X did not escalate her complaint to Stage Two.
31. Ms X said she never received a response from the Council about this specific complaint and had chased several times.
32. In May 2023, we accepted Ms X’s complaint.

Analysis

Miss Y’s care and support

33. The Council has a duty to meet the care and support needs of any person that is eligible. In Miss Y’s case, it did not provide the support between the end of July and December 2022. This is fault. The Council’s Stage One response outlined its reasons and rationale for this. I provide a breakdown under each of its points below:
1. In late-June 2022, after receiving notice from Agency A, the social worker immediately took action to find another provider.
• I have seen evidence of this.
1. In July, the Council said the social worker received a message from Miss Y after a phone call to its Business Support team. The social worker understood this as Miss Y not wanting further contact and she had support in place.
• An email from Ms X showed this phone call was from her, not Miss Y. After following up and through email, Ms X clearly asked the social worker which agency was taking over Miss Y’s support. Also, the emails with Miss Y asking for no further contact were during the previous month. But even after Miss Y said this, the social worker took initial action to find another provider for her and then didn’t follow it up.
1. In late July, the Council said the social worker contacted Agency B after receiving further contact from Ms X. Agency B wanted to arrange a visit but it did not progress as Ms X asked about direct payments. Direct payments did not proceed, and the social worker looked for another provider.
• I have seen an email from Ms X clearly saying she wanted the social worker to continue with finding a provider while she thought about direct payments. In my view, this does not justify why the Council did not continue its search from this point.
1. The Council recognised there was a period where it did not deliver the 3 hours of assessed care, but said this was because of conversations it had with Ms X and Miss Y. It would not take further action as the care was now in place.
34. The case records do not show discussion or consideration about Miss Y’s request for no further contact. I understand the social worker said she wanted to respect her wish, but on balance I also note Miss Y did say she needed the help. It appeared to be a decline of contact with the social worker, rather than declining the services altogether. There is no record about how the Council considered this situation at this point or how it would deal with it from a care support perspective. This would have been good practice for transparency.
35. I have not seen evidence to show Ms X or Miss Y said she had a support package after Agency A gave notice. This does not add weight to the Council’s explanation on why it delayed in finding support for Ms X. There is a notable gap in action to source a provider from August and when it started again in December. This is fault.
36. Taking the above into account, I am not satisfied with the Council’s explanation for the delays in finding support and I do not consider the evidence supports it. This is fault. The Council’s response also confused matters unnecessarily.
37. The faults identified meant the Council did not provide Miss Y with the assessed hours of support when it should have. Ms X provided support to Miss Y during this period so the injustice to Miss Y is limited. I recognise there was some distress on Miss Y’s part, but I consider the main injustice was to Ms X, who also dealt with the matter on her behalf. Ms X was caused significant frustration and distress, and this impacted on her own health needs at the time.

Complaint handling for this complaint

38. While Ms X said Miss Y did not have support hours in an email to the Council in September 2022, I note this was within and alongside many other concerns she had raised about other care related matters (not part of this investigation). On balance, I acknowledge the Council may have missed addressing this specific part directly in its reply, amongst all the other issues. However, I have seen Ms X’s emails clearly raising her complaint about non provision of Miss Y’s support hours to the Council twice in December 2022.
39. The Council said it did not receive the complaint emails from Ms X in December, however I can see evidence they were sent. It registered the complaint after contact from us in January 2023. It sent a Stage One response to Ms X in February. The delay from when it should have registered it in December is notably outside of the Council’s complaint policy to provide a response within 15 working days. This is fault.
40. The Council provided a copy of its Stage One complaint response from its system and addressed to her email. While I accept Ms X said she never received it, I cannot say non-receipt is fault by the Council. However, I have seen emails where Ms X chased for a complaint response, and I cannot see the Council engaged with her on this point to send a further copy of it to her. This is fault. This delayed her coming to us sooner and she did not have a chance to challenge the Stage One response with the Council.
41. Ms X went to avoidable time and trouble pursuing her complaint with the Council, causing her additional frustration.

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Agreed action

42. To remedy the injustice set out above, the Council has agreed to carry out the following actions:
43. Within one month of the final decision:
• Apologise to Ms X and Miss Y in writing for the failure to provide the support hours for five months and for the delays in handling Ms X’s complaint; and
• Pay Ms X £500 as a symbolic payment to recognise the frustration, uncertainty and distress caused to her.
44. The Council should provide us with evidence it has complied with the above actions.

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Final decision

45. I found fault with the Council which caused injustice to Ms X. The Council has agreed with my recommendations to remedy this, and I have completed my investigation.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman