Summary: The Ombudsman will not investigate Mrs B’s complaint about the Council’s actions regarding the safeguarding of her mother, Mrs C. This is because the Council’s actions have not caused either Mrs B or Mrs C a significant enough injustice to warrant an Ombudsman investigation.

The complaint

1. Mrs B says her mother, Mrs C, was not properly safeguarded by the Council and was deprived of her liberty between February 2018 and November 2019 when her sister, Mrs C’s carer, left her unattended and locked in her house for two hours each day. Mrs B says she called the Council on four separate occasions in 2018 concerned Mrs C was being deprived of her liberty when she could not gain access to the locked house. Mrs B says the Council failed to provide her with information about Mrs C and says it took notice of her sister and excluded her from having information about her. Mrs B says if she knew Mrs C was not safe in her own home she would have visited her there instead of the care home where she went twice a week.

Mrs B says the Council should:

• acknowledge what it did was wrong, including not responding to calls and complaints;
• say why it excluded her from being given information about her mother’s care;
• exclude her siblings from having information about Mrs C’s care arrangements
• speak to individuals involved.

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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’. We provide a free service, but must use public money carefully. We may decide not to start or continue with an investigation if we believe:

• it is unlikely we would find fault, or
• the fault has not caused injustice to the person who complained, or
• the injustice is not significant enough to justify our involvement, or
• it is unlikely we could add to any previous investigation by the Council, or
• it is unlikely further investigation will lead to a different outcome, or
• we cannot achieve the outcome someone wants.

(Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended)

3. The Information Commissioner's Office considers complaints about freedom of information. Its decision notices may be appealed to the First Tier Tribunal (Information Rights). So where we receive complaints about freedom of information, we normally consider it reasonable to expect the person to refer the matter to the Information Commissioner.

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How I considered this complaint

4. I considered the information Mrs B and the Council provided. I sent Mrs B a copy of my draft decision and considered her comments on it and additional documentation.

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What I found

5. Mrs B is concerned the Council did not safeguard her mother when she told it in 2018 her sister was locking her mother in the house and says it failed to provide her with any information about Mrs C’s care.
6. The Council’s response to Mrs B’s complaint says it visited Mrs C and her daughter, who was her carer at the time to discuss Mrs B’s concerns. Mrs B’s sister advised the Council Mrs C suffered with dementia and was prone to wondering. She said Mrs C was locked in the house for up to half an hour when she needed to go out and told the Council if she needed to be out longer would find someone to sit with her. The Council says they discussed the risks associated with leaving Mrs C on her own in a locked house and considered alternatives, including whether she should have a lifeline service. It says it decided Mrs C would not be able to use the lifeline effectively and advised Mrs C’s daughter to install a key safe. The Council says it contacted Mrs C’s daughter a few weeks later and she confirmed she had fitted a key safe.
7. Mrs B says this is not correct as Mrs B has had a lifeline since November 2019 when she became her carer.
8. Mrs B says the Council provided her with very little information about her mother, and she has asked the Council not to provide information to her siblings because they refused to give her information. Mrs B has been told this request is with their legal team.
9. The Council says it only gave information about Mrs C to Mrs B and her sister on a need to know basis. It says this was because no one has Power of Attorney (PoA) for Mrs C and where this is the case it does not provide detailed information.
10. The Ombudsman could not say the Council’s actions have caused Mrs B or Mrs C a significant enough injustice to warrant an investigation. The Ombudsman could not investigate what might have happened or make a finding on whether this would have been the fault of the Council as no harm came to Mrs C during the period Mrs B’s sister was caring for her. Mrs B could have asked the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) to consider whether she should have access to the information she wanted which the Council had refused her and it would have been reasonable for her to do so. The Ombudsman cannot tell the Council not to provide Mrs B’s siblings with information about her. Mrs B has been advised the Council’s legal team are considering her request. The Ombudsman cannot tell Council’s to speak to individual members of staff .
11. Mrs B says since her siblings took responsibility for managing Mrs C’s finances there has been some possible abuse. If Mrs B is concerned about missing money belonging to Mrs C’s she should report this as a criminal matter to the police.

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Final decision

12. The Ombudsman will not investigate this complaint. This is because the Council’s actions have not caused either Mrs B or Mrs C a significant enough injustice to warrant an Ombudsman investigation.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman