Summary: Mr C complained the Council failed to pay him for the support he provided to Ms X (an adult who lives with him as part of the Shared Lives scheme). We did not find fault with the actions of the Council.

The complaint

1. The complainant, whom I shall call Mr C, complained that when the day care and sessional hours stopped for Ms X due to the Covid-19 Pandemic, he had to provide support to Ms X to replace those hours and ensure his wife (Ms X’s main carer) continued to have a carer’s break. However, the Council has failed to pay him for this.

Back to top

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 an injustice, we may suggest a remedy. (Local Government Act 1974, sections 26(1) and 26A(1), as amended
3. If we are satisfied with a council’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

How I considered this complaint

4. I considered the information I received from Mr C and the Council and carried out an interview with a manager from the Council. I shared a copy of my draft decision statement with Mr C and the Council and considered any comments I received, before I made my final decision.

Back to top

What I found

Relevant Background and Legislation

5. In a shared lives schemes, adults who need care support are matched with an approved carer. The carer shares their family and community life and gives care and support to the person with care needs. Some people move in with their shared lives carer, while others are regular daytime visitors. 
6. A document produced by the UK charity organisation SharedLivesPlus, states that Shared Lives is not a 24/7 service. It says that:
• When a Shared Lives arrangement is established, the usual expectation is that the Shared Lives carer(s) will maintain 24-hour responsibility for people using Shared Lives, but they will not be expected to provide 24/7 support. This is not reasonable, practical or desirable from the point of view of the Shared Lives carer or the person using Shared Lives. If an individual is solely reliant on their Shared Lives carer this can create an unhealthy dependent relationship, limit the individual’s independence and their ability to have a social life outside the home. Where Shared Lives arrangements are treated as 24/7 there is a much greater risk of Shared Lives arrangement breakdown and Shared Lives carer recruitment and retention becomes increasingly difficult.
• As a general rule the funding for live-in Shared Lives arrangements covers the care and support of an individual for early mornings, evenings and weekends. Sometimes Shared Lives carers will provide additional support during the day. If this is the case it needs to be agreed with them, they should be paid for providing this additional support, and it should be looked at how and when they will have breaks from their role as a Shared Lives carer.
• An individual living in a Shared Lives arrangement may wish to receive day support from another Shared Lives carer via their Shared Lives scheme, attend a day centre, access support from a personal assistant, attend other day activities or be supported to work or volunteer. Any day activities that the individual is accessing should be funded through their care package and is in addition to the funding of the Shared Lives arrangement.

What happened

7. Before lockdown started in April 2020, Ms X went to a day care centre one day a week and received seven hours of support from an outside care worker on another day. This was meant to provide Mr C’s wife (who is Ms X’s main carer) a break from supporting Ms X, to prevent the placement from breaking down. However, Mr C told me that:
• During lockdown, the day care support and sessional hours had to stop. This meant that he and his wife had to provide additional support, and come up with additional activities, to fill this gap. It has been very stressful to keep Ms X occupied 24/7.
• As Shared Lives is not a 24-hours service, he believes he and his wife went above and beyond their roles as Shared Lives Carers by providing 24/7 support without having any carer breaks.
• All he has wanted is a payment for the extra service they have had to provide, which went above and beyond their role.
8. Mr C emailed the Council on 5 April 2020. He said that:
• It was very difficult to have Ms X at home 24/7. He and his wife were trying to occupy her by doing additional activities, such as: taking her for a daily exercise walk, baking (which was one of her routines), arts and crafts, teaching board games and how to do jigsaws, colouring etc.
• It was stressful keeping her occupied and looking after Ms X 24/7, which was going beyond their roles as Shared Lives carers. As such, he felt they should be paid for the extra service they were having to give.
9. The Council told Shared Lives carers on 8 and 9 April 2020, that it would pay them a one-off payment of £1,080 to support them at this time. The funds could be used to cover additional costs for food (including take-aways), heating, renting a movie or paying for a subscription etc. It added that it could also be used to pay another person in the household to provide some support to the cared for to give the main carer a break.
10. On 23 April 2020, Mr C told the Council that he was doing the equivalent of two days of day care with Ms X to give his wife a break. However, he said he does not get paid for this.
11. Mr C wrote an email to the Council on 29 June 2020, with a timesheet to show what support he had been providing to Ms X over the last two weeks. Mr C said Ms X had become clingier and he has provided support to her to give his wife a break.
12. The Council contacted Mr C on 8 July 2020 to say he did not have a ‘specific agreement’ in place to provide care support to Ms X. It explained that, as Ms X’s outside support was not yet able to resume, it would carry out a review of her care with the aim to put such a specific user agreement in place for him and Ms X. Once this specific agreement was in place, he could be paid for his support through Ms X’s direct payments. The review took place one week later. It said that: Ms X has been unable to access her regular routines and structure. This has impacted on her becoming more dependent on Mrs C as main carer. This has been compounded by the fact that outside services have not been accessed, and respite has been unable to be provided. To enable Mrs C to have a break from her caring role, Mr C is happy to provide some support, whilst the restrictions are in place. Once restrictions are lifted and services resume to normality this will not be required.
13. Mr C told the Council that he did already have an agreement in place, signed in 2018. He said it allowed him to support anyone living in his home. He said he should also be paid for the support he provided to Ms X for the three months before 1 July 2020. However, he says this payment should not come from the one off £1,080 payment that all Shared Lives Carers received. It should be paid in addition to this.
14. In response, the Council said the 2018 carer agreement relates to Mr C being able to care for people who are matched to him ‘specifically’. It does not relate to Ms X.
15. The Council organised a meeting with Mr C in August 2020. The minutes state that Mrs C is Ms X’s named main carer under the Shared Lives Scheme. The Council explained that Mr C did not, in the past, have to provide sessional support hours to Ms X. As such, he was not included in Ms X’s list of “approved and matched carers”. He could therefore not submit invoices for a client that he was not matched to for support. However, this had been resolved by carrying out a care review and making an interim arrangement so Mr C can provide paid support to Ms X until her matched carers returned to work.
16. In response to Mr C’s complaint, the Council has told Mr C that it would pay an additional £12.08 a week (for 13 weeks). This amount, added to the £1,080 (£90 per week) Mrs C received (from which she could pay Mr C – see paragraph 9) mean the total amount was £102.80 per week. This is the amount Ms X receives for the day care and weekly hourly sessions. This meant that Mr C had been fully paid for the additional support he provided from April to June 2020.
17. However, Mr C says it was not fair for the Council to pay £90 a week to all Shared Lives Carers as some carers did not have people living in with them and did therefore not have any additional costs or work and could keep all the additional money for themselves.

Analysis

18. The reason the Council could not pay Mr C for the support he provided to Ms X, from her personal budget, was because there was no ‘specific agreement’ in place for that. The Council has explained that the reason for this was that Mr C never had to provide sessional support hours to Ms X because these were provided by outside carers. As such, Mr C was not included in Ms X’s list of “approved and matched carers”.
19. However, Mr C was paid for his support from the one-off payment of £1,080 his wife received (which could be used to pay family members) and an additional payment of £12.08 a week.
20. Following a care review in July 2020, the Council put Mr C on Ms X’s list of approved carers and put an interim arrangement in place from 1 July 2020 that enabled him to submit invoices and for the Council to pay for these from Ms X’s personal budget.
21. I did not find fault with regards to the above.

Back to top

Final decision

22. For reasons explained above, I did not uphold Mr C’s complaint.
23. Investigator’s decision on behalf of the Ombudsman

Back to top

Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman