Summary: We will not investigate Ms X’s complaint about the Council arranging for her relative, Mrs Y, to live with Mr Z on discharge from hospital. This is because there is insufficient evidence of fault causing sufficient injustice to justify our involvement.

The complaint

1. Ms X complained the Council arranged for her relative, Mrs Y, to live in a place that was not safe after a hospital stay. Ms X said Mrs Y was not able to raise concerns because she was worried about the consequences. Ms X said this caused her significant distress as neither she nor Mrs Y were listened to. Mrs Y has since died.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

2. 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:

• there is not enough evidence of fault to justify investigating, or
• any injustice is not significant enough to justify our involvement, 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

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

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My assessment

What happened

5. Mrs Y went into hospital after a fall. Council records indicate that, when she was medically fit for discharge, there was a dispute about whether she should live with Ms X or with another relative, Mr Z. Council records state a social worker sought Mrs Y’s wishes and she said she wished to return to Mr Z’s home. Ms X despite this as she says Mrs Y was confused about which home was being referred to.
6. Shortly after Mrs Y returned home, an occupational therapist (OT) carried out two home visits to assess Mrs Y’s mobility. They did not identify any concerns.
7. A few days later, Ms X complained that Mr Z was not ensuring Mrs Y received appropriate care and that a third party was helping with personal care, which was not appropriate. She also complained about the social worker involved.
8. Around this time, the Council carried out a Mental Capacity Assessment (MCA), which decided Mrs Y did not have capacity to manager her finances, and a Best Interest decision that Mr Z should manage Mrs Y’s money. Council records in relation to those decision record a safeguarding referral Mr Z made about Ms X.
9. The complaint correspondence also refers to a dispute between Ms X and Mr Z about Ms X’s contact with Mrs Y.

My assessment

10. Although Mrs Y appears to have said she wanted to live with Mr Z, the records suggest she did not have capacity to make decisions about her care or where she should live when she was discharged from hospital. I would therefore expect to the Council to have carried out an MCA and made a Best Interest decision but have seen no records to indicate it did so.
11. That said, an OT visited twice, and the Council did carry out an MCA and made a Best Interests decision about managing Mrs Y’s money within a month of Mrs Y returning to live with Mr Z, and the records do not identify any concerns about Mrs Y’s welfare, nor that Mrs Y did not want to live with Mr Z.
12. Whilst the records show a history of conflict between Ms X and Mr Z, and each had raised safeguarding concerns about the other, there is insufficient evidence of fault by the Council in arranging for Mrs Y to live with Mr Z to justify further investigation. Even if we found fault, the injustice caused to Ms X would be limited to some uncertainty about whether the outcome would have been different if formal assessments and decisions had been made. That is not a sufficient injustice to justify further investigation. Further, we could not remedy any injustice to Mrs Y as she has since died. On balance, therefore, we could not achieve any worthwhile outcome by investigating further.

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Final decision

13. We will not investigate Ms X’s complaint because there is insufficient evidence of fault causing a sufficient injustice to justify our involvement.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman