Summary: We will not investigate this complaint about a Council social worker failing to ensure a police officer was accompanied aby an appropriate adult. This is because there is another body better placed to consider the complaint and because there is insufficient evidence of fault to justify an investigation.

The complaint

1. Mr X complains the Council’s social worker failed to ensure a police officer was accompanied by an appropriate adult while she was interviewed. He says his wife has dementia and so should have been treated as vulnerable person. He says because of the Council’s actions, the police officer may have put leading questions to his wife.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

2. The Ombudsman investigates 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 may decide not to continue with an investigation if we decide:

• there is not enough evidence of fault to justify investigating, or
• there is another body better placed to consider this complaint,

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

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How I considered this complaint

3. I considered information provided by the complainant and the Council.
4. I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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My assessment

5. Mr X’s wife raised a concern about Mr X. Due to the nature of the concerns raised, the police were involved in investigating the allegations.
6. It is the police’s responsibility to decide whether another person needs to be present while they interview an individual as part of their investigation. It would not be the social worker’s decision.
7. As Mr X is unhappy about how the police investigated the concerns, the appropriate body to deal with the complaint is the police force who conducted the investigation. It is also open to Mr X to make a complaint to the Independent Office for Police Conduct if he is unhappy with the police’s response.
8. Further, it is accepted Mr X’s wife has dementia. However, the first principle of the Mental Capacity Act 2005 is presumption of capacity. This means every adult must be assumed to have capacity to make their own decisions unless it is proved otherwise. You also cannot assume someone cannot decide for themselves just because they have a particular medical condition. The Council did not complete any mental capacity assessment for Mr X’s wife to show she was unable to make decisions about being interviewed on her own.
9. Therefore, there is no evidence to suggest the Council should have considered whether Mr X’s wife needed an appropriate adult during its consideration of the safeguarding concerns.

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Final decision

10. We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint as there is another body better placed to consider the complaint and because there is insufficient evidence of fault to justify an investigation.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman