Summary: Mr X complained the Council has failed to provide his assessed need of 28 hours per week of support and advocacy to him. We find the Council was at fault for its delay in finding a potential new care provider for Mr X and for failing to clarify with him how he wanted to proceed with his care and support needs. However, this fault did not cause Mr X a significant injustice.

The complaint

1. Mr X complained the Council has failed to provide his assessed need of 28 hours per week of support and advocacy to him.
2. Mr X says the Council’s failures means he has been suffering a mental health crisis, and he now lives in constant fear and anxiety.

Back to top

The Ombudsman’s role and powers

3. 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)
4. 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)
5. 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)

Back to top

What I have and have not investigated

6. My investigation covers matters from January 2024 to January 2025. Any references to events outside of these dates is for contextual purposes only.

Back to top

How I considered this complaint

7. I considered evidence provided by Mr X and the Council as well as relevant law, policy and guidance.
8. Mr X and the Council had an opportunity to comment on my draft decision. I considered any comments received before making a final decision.

Back to top

What I found

Relevant legislation and guidance

9. 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.
10. The Care Act 2014 gives councils a legal responsibility to provide a care and support plan (or a support plan for a carer). 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. When preparing a care and support plan the council must involve any carer the adult has. The support plan must include a personal budget, which is the money the council has worked out it will cost to arrange the necessary care and support for that person.
11. The care and support statutory guidance sets out the role of advocates in the assessment and support planning process. It says at the point of first contact, councils must form a judgement about whether a person has substantial difficulty in being involved with these processes. If it is thought that they do, and that there is no appropriate individual to support and represent them for the purpose of facilitating their involvement, then the council must arrange for an independent advocate to support and represent the person.

What happened

12. This chronology provides an overview of key events in this case and does not detail everything that happened.
13. Mr X has care and support needs. The Council assessed Mr X’s needs in October 2023. It decided he needed 28 hours of support per week. The hours covered support with shopping, personal hygiene, maintaining Mr X’s home and liaising with contractors and a solicitor on a legal case about poor building works in Mr X’s home.
14. Mr X had an independent advocate (Mr Z). His role was to deal with environmental health issues (smoke from his neighbour’s house) and the legal case.
15. Mr X had a mental health crisis at the end of December. He went to stay in a crisis centre.
16. Mr X returned home in early January 2024. He raised concerns about the care provider (Provider A) not providing him with his assessed care and support hours. Mr X’s social worker started searching for another provider to cover the two weekends in a month Provider A could not provide cover.
17. Mr X attended accident and emergency after experiencing suicidal thoughts. He went into a mental health hospital a few days later.
18. The social worker visited Mr X at the hospital. Mr X said he was struggling with the smoke from his neighbour’s house, and he wanted his full care package in place.
19. The social worker had several discussions with Mr X about updating his needs assessment/care and support plan. The support worker from Provider A helped him with this.
20. Provider A contacted Mr X in late January and offered him a new care rota. It said it still could not cover every other weekend.
21. Mr X spoke to Provider A and he said he did not want a new provider to do all his care and his support hours. He reiterated he wanted an alternative provider to cover the missing weekend. He also said he did not want to recruit a personal assistant (PA) as he would have to pay for mileage.
22. An officer from the Council’s provider management team emailed the social worker and said other providers were reluctant to offer a part package for the hours Provider A could not cover. She said the options were to find a new provider to cover all the hours, support Mr X with recruiting a PA or wait for Provider A to recruit new support workers.
23. Mr X left hospital at the end of January.
24. The social worker sent the email from the provider management team to Mr X for his comments. Mr X responded and asked why the weekend was being offered as a part package. He said it was better to ask for a provider just for the weekend.
25. A support service for autistic people had a meeting with the social worker in early February. It agreed to provide support alongside Provider A to ensure Mr X had specialised support for his needs. The Council decided the support would be time limited with the main purpose being to upskill Provider A. Mr X said he would accept the support.
26. Mr X sent several emails to the Council and Provider A and said he was struggling to cope. The Council held a multi-disciplinary meeting in March to discuss the best way of supporting Mr X. The participants in the meeting agreed they would meet with the support workers to arrange a weekly plan for Mr X.
27. The social worker met with two members of staff from Provider A. One of the support workers said they felt uncomfortable working with Mr X. The social worker asked Provider A to send information on what dates and times Mr X would receive his support hours. Provider A sent the information a few days later and said it would cover some hours but not all.
28. Mr X emailed the social worker in April and said he wanted to cancel all support from Provider A. The social worker asked Mr X if he wanted to find an alternative care provider or employ a PA. Mr X said he did not know. He said the Council had tried the PA option before, but it had not worked.
29. Provider A emailed the social worker and said some support workers could not work with Mr X, and others were leaving to start a different job. Therefore, Mr X would not have cover for his care package apart from every other weekend.
30. The social worker visited Mr X and agreed she would look for another provider to cover the whole care package. She also said she would look for a PA for Mr X.
31. Provider A offered two new support workers to provide support for Mr X in the week. Mr X said he did not want to accept support from the new workers because they were inexperienced and strangers to him.
32. Provider A continued to offer Mr X some support. Mr X only accepted support from the support workers he knew.
33. The social worker continued to contact different providers to see if they could provide Mr X with his full care package. She also encouraged Mr X to engage with the support from Provider A.
34. Provider A found a new support worker for Mr X who could cover most of his support hours. It explained she had experience of caring for people with autism. Mr X said he could not cope with the weekly turnover of staff and would not accept the new worker.
35. The social worker continued to look for alternative providers for Mr X. A new provider (Provider B) had a meeting with the social worker in mid-June and agreed to complete an assessment of Mr X’s needs.
36. Provider B had a meeting to discuss a potential new support package at Mr X’s house in early July. Provider B said Mr X would have to pay for mileage. Mr X said he could not decide whether to stay with Provider A or move to Provider B.
37. The social worker had a discussion with another officer about the mileage issue. The officer said Mr X could use a prepayment card with agreed funding for him and Provider B to use as they saw appropriate.
38. Mr X emailed the social worker and decided not to proceed because Provider B would not cover mileage costs. He said he would stay with Provider A.
39. Provider A continued to have issues providing consistent support to Mr X because of staffing issues.
40. Mr Z emailed Mr X in late July and said he would close the smoke issues and revisit matters in the Autumn. Mr X said he was unhappy with this.
41. The Council contacted Mr X in early August and suggested using a prepayment card to recruit a PA or use a recruitment agency for this. Mr X declined because of the mileage costs.
42. Mr X told the social worker to serve notice on Provider A. The Council decided to provide Mr X with two hours of support per week from mental health social workers. This was to help him collect his medication and go shopping.
43. The social worker had a meeting with Mr Z in mid-August to discuss what support he could provide to Mr X. Mr Z said he could not support Mr X with the smoke issues. The social worker told Mr Z to contact Mr X to discuss this. She also asked Mr Z to provide Mr X with support for his legal case against the builder.
44. A new provider (Provider C) assessed Mr X at the end of August for a potential new support package. Mr X said if he had to pay a care contribution he would cancel the care.
45. Mr X emailed the Council in mid-September and said he would accept support from Provider C if it covered all his assessed care and support hours.
46. Mr Z emailed Mr X and asked what issues he wanted support with. Mr X responded and said he was unhappy Mr Z had not helped him. He asked for a new advocate.
47. The social worker emailed Mr Z and asked him to support Mr X with his legal case until he had a new advocate.
48. Provider C emailed the social worker at the end of September. It said it had found a support worker to work with Mr X for five days a week, but it was waiting for a response from the Disclosure and Barring Service. It said it was still looking for a worker to cover the other two days. The Council’s mental health social workers continued supporting Mr X during this time.
49. Provider C had a meeting with Mr X in early November to discuss starting his care package. The manager at Provider C emailed Mr X a few days later and said he was moving to a new care provider (Provider D). As a result, Provider C was closing its local branch.
50. Provider D agreed to support Mr X with a care package. It offered him support for five days per week. Mr X expressed concerns about the support worker.
51. Provider D contacted the Council in early December and said it could not meet Mr X’s care and support needs.
52. Mr Z emailed Mr X and said he had spoken to his manager, but it was not possible to provide an alternative advocate. He said the advocacy team could not provide any further support for the smoke issues. Mr X emailed the social worker and said he wanted the lack of advocacy support to be raised as a complaint. The social worker asked Mr X to detail his complaint so she could send it to the advocacy service.
53. Mr X complained to the Council in December about its failure to provide him with appropriate support. He also said he did not have an advocate.
54. The social worker found a care provider (Provider E) that could cover some, but not all, of Mr X’s care and support hours. It said it could not provide support until January 2025. The support would start at 12 hours per week and then increase when it had more capacity.
55. The Council responded to Mr X’s complaint in early January 2025. It said it had not been able to secure a complete support package, but it had provided him with regular updates on progress with identifying a provider. It said it offered him a respite package, but he declined the offer. It also said an officer helped for two hours per week with medication collection as an interim arrangement. Finally, it said it could liaise with the advocacy service with his concerns about a lack of advocate.

Back to top

Analysis

56. The Council was aware of the issues with Provider A not providing all of Mr X’s care and support hours in January 2024. It acted without delay to explore alternatives. It explained to Mr X at the end of January it could not find a provider to cover the alternate weekends Provider A could not provide cover. However, it could look for a provider to cover all his hours, he could wait for Provider A to recruit more staff, or he could employ a PA. Mr X did not give a clear direction how he wanted to proceed. However, I consider the Council should have also clarified with Mr X what he wanted to do. Its failure to do so is fault.
57. Mr X asked the Council to find an alternative provider in April 2024. The Council acted without delay and contacted several care providers. However, it was unsuccessful in finding any alternatives until mid-June. This delay is service failure. During this time, Provider A tried to cover some of Mr X’s support hours. Mr X regularly refused to accept care from support workers he did not know.
58. Provider B said it could offer Mr X’s full care and support package in July 2024. Mr X refused this because he did not want to pay mileage costs. However, I am satisfied the Council offered Mr X a suitable alternative care provider that would have met his care and support needs which he chose not to accept. The Council suggested the option of a prepayment card for Provider B, but Mr X said this would not work. The Council suggested another alternative to Mr X such as recruiting a PA. Mr X declined this. The Council continued to search for alternative providers for Mr X but was unsuccessful in finding one that could meet his needs. I am aware since February 2025 Mr X is receiving some support from Provider E. If Mr X is unhappy with the support, he will need to make a new complaint to the Council.
59. While the Council was at fault, I do not consider this has caused Mr X a significant injustice. It is unlikely it would have a found a care provider Mr X was happy with even if there had been no delay or it had clarified with him in January 2024 what he wanted to do. I am satisfied from July 2024 Mr X had two suitable offers available to him. That he chose not to accept them is not the fault of the Council.
60. Mr X says the Autism Act 2009 and the Care Act 2014 requires the Council to provide him with an advocate and it has failed to provide an adequate advocacy service. There is no specific requirement in the Autism Act 2009 to provide an advocate. The Care Act 2014 says councils must find and engage with an advocate during the assessment and support planning process if it feels the person who needs the care has substantial difficulty engaging in the process.
61. Mr Z was Mr X’s appointed advocate. In early 2024 the Council had discussions about with Mr X about amending his needs assessment/care and support plan. It did not engage with Mr Z which is fault. However, Provider A provided Mr X with support in amending the assessment/plan and so I do not consider this fault caused Mr X a significant injustice. The Council had a meeting with Mr Z to encourage him to support Mr X with the legal case and the smoke issues. It also offered to send a complaint to the advocacy service on Mr X’s behalf. These issues are outside the assessment and care planning process. I am satisfied the Council tried to support Mr X the best it could with his concerns about his advocacy provision.

Back to top

Decision

62. I have completed my investigation. There was fault by the Council, but this did not cause Mr X a significant injustice.

Investigator’s decision on behalf of the Ombudsman

Back to top

Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman