Summary: We will not investigate this complaint about adult social care in a care home. There is not a significant injustice to the person who complained to justify our involvement.

The complaint

1. Ms B says the Council failed in the care it provided to her relative, Mr C, and the care provider acting on its behalf lied in its complaint response. Ms B has been stressed and wants a truthful response.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

2. We may investigate a complaint on behalf of someone who has died or who cannot authorise someone to act for them. The complaint may be made by:

• their personal representative (if they have one), or
• someone we consider to be suitable.

(Local Government Act 1974, section 26A(2), as amended)

3. Mr C has died; we have accepted Ms B as a suitable representative.
4. We investigate complaints about ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’, which we call ‘fault’. We must also consider whether any fault has had an adverse impact on the person making the complaint, which we call ‘injustice’. We provide a free service but must use public money carefully. We do not start or continue an investigation if we decide:

• any injustice is not significant enough to justify our involvement, or
• further investigation would not lead to a different outcome, or
• there is another body better placed to consider this complaint, or
• there is no worthwhile outcome achievable by our investigation.

(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 provided by the complainant.
6. I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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My assessment

7. Mr C lived in a care home arranged by the Council to meet his adult social care needs. Actions of the care provider are on behalf of the Council.
8. Ms B raised concerns about Mr C’s care over the 12 months before his death. The care provider says it responded to Ms B’s concerns, but its retention policy means it does not have copies of the e-mail correspondence. Ms B disputes that it responded to all her concerns. The care provider said in future it will ensure to keep copies of relevant e-mails on the resident’s conversation records which it keeps for longer.
9. Although this would have been frustrating for Ms B it would not justify our resource to investigate. I also recognise the upset at feeling a relative is receiving poor care and not having their needs met. But we do not investigate all complaints we receive. In deciding whether to investigate we need to consider various tests. These include the alleged injustice to the person complaining. We only investigate the most serious complaints.
10. We can no longer provide Mr C with a remedy for any poor care he may have received. The Care Quality Commission (CQC) is the independent regulator of health and social care in England. The CQC has fundamental standards below which a person’s care should never fall. The CQC has rated the care home as requiring improvement. The CQC set out the areas where the care home needed to be improved and asked it to send an action plan which it will check. There is therefore no wider public interest for the Ombudsman to investigate, as it is unlikely we would add to the CQC investigation.
11. Ms B is also unhappy with the way the care provider dealt with her complaint on behalf of the Council. But it is not a good use of public resources to look at the Council’s complaints handling if we are not going to look at the substantive issue complained about. We will not therefore investigate this issue separately.

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Final decision

12. We will not investigate Ms B’s complaint because Ms B’s injustice is not significant enough to justify our involvement. We can provide no remedy to Mr C who would have had the most significant injustice from any poor care. But there is no worthwhile outcome achievable by an investigation now. The CQC is already involved with this care provider, and it is unlikely an Ombudsman investigation would add anything further.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman