Summary: We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint about the Council’s decision to treat gifts made to him and other family from his mother Mrs Y’s trust as a deprivation of her assets to pay for her care. There is not enough evidence of fault in the Council’s decision-making process here to warrant us investigating.

The complaint

1. Mr X is Mrs Y’s son. Mrs Y has a form of dementia and has lived in a privately‑funded care home placement since late 2021.
2. Mr X complains the Council has wrongly decided five gifts of £50,000 from Mrs Y’s trust to family members amounted to a deprivation of her assets to be used for her care fees.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

3. We investigate complaints of injustice caused by ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’. I have used the word fault to refer to these. We consider whether there was fault in the way an organisation made its decision. If there was no fault in how the organisation made its decision, we cannot question the outcome. (Local Government Act 1974, section 34(3), as amended)
4. We provide a free service but must use public money carefully. We do not start or continue an investigation if we decide there is not enough evidence of fault to justify investigating. (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended, section 34(B))

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How I considered this complaint

5. I considered information from Mr X and the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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My assessment

6. Mrs Y set up an ‘asset protection trust’ in 2013 with her late husband. The proceeds from Mrs Y’s house sale and other funds went into the trust. The house monies initially went directly to Mrs Y. She used them for some time to pay her care fees before the remainder was moved into the trust.
7. The Council says it made its decision on the trust and deprivation of assets issue in 2023. Officers wrote to another member of Mrs Y’s family who had received one of the trust payments in June 2023, in final response to their complaint about the Council’s decision. Mr X approached the Council again on the same matter in early 2025. The Council referred Mr X back to its 2023 decision as had been provided to Mrs Y’s other relative.
8. We are not an appeal body. We may only criticise a council’s decision where there is evidence of fault in its decision-making process and but for that fault officers would have made a different decision. So we consider the processes councils have followed to make decisions. We cannot replace a council’s decision with our own or someone else’s opinion if the decision has been reached after following proper process.
9. In response to Mr X’s complaint, the Council’s officers reviewed its previous decision on the same matter. They took account of what happened with Mrs Y’s house sale monies. Officers sought legal advice on what that use of those monies and the other relevant terms and conditions of the trust meant for Mrs Y’s access to all funds held within it, and any interest the trust accrued. They used their legal advice to inform their decision that the payments to family members amounted to a deprivation of assets. Officers determined the sum paid to the five relatives from the trust should be treated by the Council as notional capital, money available to Mrs Y to pay care fees.
10. There is not enough evidence of fault in the Council’s decision-making process here to warrant an investigation. Officers gathered relevant evidence about Mrs Y’s finances and the trust and took legal advice. They followed the appropriate process to make their professional judgement decision on the deprivation of assets issue and there are no grounds for us to go behind or criticise it. We recognise Mr X disagrees with the decision. But it is not fault for a council to properly make a decision with which someone disagrees.

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Final decision

11. We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint because there is not enough evidence of Council fault to warrant us investigating.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman