Summary: Miss X complains about the way the Council handled concerns about her children and failings in its complaints process. She says its faults caused her considerable distress. The Council was at fault for delays in the complaints process, errors in its records and inaccuracies in an assessment. It should pay Miss X £600 and review its processes.

The complaint

1. Miss X complains about the Council’s involvement with her children and about its complaints handling. In particular she complains the Council:
1. Did not provide a proper apology because it did not address the specific points where it was at fault;
2. Did not fully recognise the injustice caused when offering a payment of £300 for the delays in the complaints process;
3. Wrongly recorded proven sexual abuse against her as “alleged”;
4. Was wrong to conclude officers had made sufficient enquiries about the level of care provided to her sons;
5. Did not follow up inconsistencies in officers’ accounts in relation to two complaints;
6. Failed to interview a key witness, a domestic abuse worker;
7. Included inaccurate and out-of-date information in an assessment dated 1 December 2018
8. Inappropriately shared information about her former partner with her and vice versa; and
9. Informed the boys’ school about allegations against her but did not tell it these were later withdrawn.
2. Miss X says she suffered considerable distress because of the Council’s failings. She says the Council made her look like a child abuser and made her feel worthless. She also says she lost contact with her sons for three years as a result of the Council’s actions.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

3. 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)
4. We investigate complaints of injustice caused by ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’. I have used the word ‘fault’ to refer to these. We cannot question whether a council’s decision is right or wrong simply because the complainant disagrees with it. We must consider whether there was fault in the way the decision was reached. (Local Government Act 1974, section 34(3), as amended)
5. We cannot investigate late complaints unless we decide there are good reasons. Late complaints are when someone takes more than 12 months to complain to us about something a council has done. (Local Government Act 1974, sections 26B and 34D, as amended)
6. This complaint relates to events going back more than 12 months before the date the complaint was made to us. However, I have exercised discretion to investigate because the reason for the delay in complaining to us was due to significant delays in the Council’s complaints process.
7. We cannot investigate complaints about what happens in schools. (Local Government Act 1974, Schedule 5, paragraph 5(b), as amended)
8. We cannot investigate a complaint about the start of court action or what happened in court. (Local Government Act 1974, Schedule 5/5A, paragraph 1/3, as amended)
9. 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)

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How I considered this complaint

10. I spoke to Miss X and considered the information she provided.
11. I considered the Council’s replies to my enquiries and the records of its investigation of the complaints.
12. I considered relevant law and guidance, as set out below, and our guidance on remedies.
13. Miss X and the Council had an opportunity to comment on my draft decision and I considered their comments before making a final decision.

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What I found

Relevant law and guidance

Children’s statutory complaints process

14. The law sets out a three stage procedure for councils to follow when looking at complaints about children’s social care services. At stage 2 of this procedure, the Council appoints an Investigating Officer and an Independent Person (who is responsible for overseeing the investigation). If a complainant is unhappy with the outcome of the stage 2 investigation, they can ask for a stage 3 review.
15. If a council has investigated something under this procedure, the Ombudsman would not normally re-investigate the complaints unless he considers that investigation was flawed.

Child in need

16. Section 17 of the Children Act 1989 says councils must safeguard and promote the welfare of children within their area who are in need. A child is in need if:
• He is unlikely to achieve or maintain a reasonable standard of health or development unless the council provides support; or
• His health or development is likely to be significantly impaired unless the council provides support; or
• He is disabled.
17. Where a council thinks a child is “in need” it should arrange for a social worker to carry out an assessment. If the council decides the child is “in need” it will develop a child in need plan setting out the support the child needs. It will monitor the delivery of that support and keep the plan under review through regular child in need meetings.
18. Representatives from the child’s school will usually be invited to attend the child in need meetings.

Private court proceedings

19. Where parents have separated and cannot agree arrangements for where a child should live or contact arrangements with an absent parent, they may apply to the court for it to decide what should happen. In such cases, the court may ask the council to carry out an assessment and make recommendations about what should happen.

Background

20. Miss X separated from the father of two of her children, Mr F, many years ago. The children have at times lived with her and had contact with Mr F, and at other times they lived with Mr F. The court decided at various points where the children should live and the contact arrangements. The Council carried out assessments and made recommendations to the court about what should happen.
21. Miss X is in a new relationship and has younger children with her new partner.
22. In 2017 and early 2018, the Council was concerned about the impact of conflict between Miss X and Mr F on the two older children. It was not concerned about Miss X’s younger children.
23. Miss X made a number of complaints about the Council’s handling of the older children’s case. The Council investigated these complaints using the children’s statutory complaints process. Miss X was unhappy with the stage 2 report and asked for a stage 3 panel. The stage 3 panel asked the Council to investigate four of the 12 complaints again.
24. A second investigating officer carried out a fresh investigation of the four complaints and produced a second stage 2 report. Miss X was not happy with the second stage 2 report. A second stage 3 panel, made up of the same panel members, considered those concerns.
25. At each stage, the Council accepted the findings and recommendations.

This investigation

26. Although there were problems in the complaints process that meant some complaints were investigated a second time, I consider that overall the investigations were comprehensive. Therefore, I decided not to reinvestigate the complaints.
27. In this investigation, I have considered Miss X’s concerns about the complaints process itself, the remedy offered by the Council and whether the Council has implemented the recommendations made during the complaints process.

(a) The Council’s apology

28. Miss X is unhappy with the apology letters the Council sent her because the Council did not apologise for each specific failing. She does not feel it is sufficient for the Council to say it is sorry she felt distressed as this implies she was in the wrong for feeling that way.
29. In its letter in August 2018, following the first stage 2 report, the Council said it “would like to acknowledge the distress you felt this complaint has caused” and apologised for one specific error towards the end of the letter.
30. In its letter in December 2018 after the first stage 3 panel it apologised “for any distress or upset caused which has necessitated your request for an independent Stage 3 Panel” and apologised that the stage 2 investigation “was not sufficiently robust”.
31. In July 2019, after the second stage 2 report, it again acknowledged “the distress you felt this complaint has caused” and apologised for a lack of clarity in the wording of an assessment.
32. In November 2019, after the second stage 3 panel, it acknowledged the apology provided in earlier adjudication letters “was not sufficient” and went on to apologise for specific failings and the injustice they caused.

Finding

33. The Council accepted in November 2019 that its earlier apology letters were “not sufficient”. It has now sent an appropriate apology letter, which does address the specific failings identified. Although there was a delay in sending an appropriate apology letter, I do not consider this warrants a separate finding of fault. I will deal with the question of delays in the complaints process below.

(b) Remedy offered for delays in the complaints process

34. The Council offered to pay Miss X £300 for the delays in investigating her complaint. Miss X says this does not reflect the tremendous distress caused by the actions she complained about. She says she was made to look like a child abuser and to feel worthless, and the Council’s actions led to a loss of contact with her older children.
35. In deciding on the appropriate payment, the Council said it considered our guidance on remedies and, in particular, an example of delays in complaints handling where a payment of £200 was made. The Council noted the delays in this case were longer than in the example and therefore offered £300.

Finding

36. Miss X first complained to the Council in May 2017 and the complaints process concluded in October 2019. That is much longer than we would usually expect to see. This was partly due to the need to reinvestigate four complaints because the original investigation was inadequate but also due to general delays. For example, it took six months from the stage 3 panel’s recommendation about reinvestigating to the second stage 2 report. The overall delay was fault, which caused Miss X additional time and trouble when pursuing her complaint. Given the very considerable delays that occurred I consider the remedy for this part of the complaint should be increased from £300 to £400.

(c) Wrongly recording sexual abuse as “alleged”

37. When Miss X obtained historical records, she found sexual abuse she suffered as a young person was repeatedly referred to as “alleged” even after the perpetrator was convicted. She provided evidence to show the sexual abuse was referred to as “alleged” three years after the conviction. She said this caused her considerable distress. She says social workers are still using that term but my investigation has only considered the period covered by the complaints process.

Finding

38. This complaint was upheld at the first stage 3 panel. The fault caused Miss X distress. It does not appear the Council has specifically apologised for this and I consider it should do so. It should also make a payment to remedy the distress caused.

(d) The Council wrongly concluded the older children’s needs were met

39. Miss X disagrees with the findings of the second investigating officer and stage 3 panel that Council officers had made appropriate enquiries following her reports about Mr F’s failure to meet the children’s basic needs. She says the investigating officers did not consider all the examples she provided. She says one of the children, who is now living with Miss X, suffered emotional and physical harm as a result of Mr F’s poor parenting.

Finding

40. The documents I have seen show Miss X made a number of reports about the care Mr F provided to the children. The second investigating officer considered the Council’s records and concluded that it had considered the reports Miss X made on each occasion. The Council was satisfied that Mr F was meeting the children’s basic care needs. It is not my role nor that of the statutory complaints process to determine whether the Council’s conclusions were correct where they were made without fault.

(e) Failure to follow up on inconsistencies

41. Miss X says two officers who were interviewed by both investigating officers gave an inconsistent accounts in relation to two of her complaints but the second investigating officer did not look into those inconsistencies.
42. The first complaint was that in a child protection meeting the social worker threatened to put Miss X’s younger children into care. The stage 2 reports show the social worker, officer 1, said at both interviews that she was only concerned about the older children. The reports show another officer present at the meeting, officer 2, said she did not recall this being said but it would have been given “as a worst case scenario”. She said if a threat was made in the way described by Miss X she would have reported it to a supervisor. When interviewed a second time she said she could not recall officer 1 making the threat and if she had heard such a statement she would have remembered it.
43. The investigating officer was not able to make a finding on the complaint because of the conflict of recollection. The failure of the school to engage with the complaints process meant there was no independent professional to confirm what was said. The Council was not able to compel the school to participate.
44. The second complaint was that officer 1 insisted Miss X tell her older children she was dragged into an alley and raped when she was younger. She said officer 1 went on to tell them this herself.
45. In the initial interview, officer 1 said this was not true. She said she had advised Miss X to tell the children the truth but Miss X was reluctant to do so. In the second interview, she said Miss X had wanted to get the children to understand her point of view. She said any information shared was by Miss X and she was certain rape was not mentioned.
46. Officer 2 said the purpose of this meeting was for Miss X to explain to the children the difficult relationship with their father. She said at least one child already “knew the basics”.
47. The second stage 2 report refers to officer 2’s record of the meeting made at the time, which stated there were discussions about events when Miss X lived with Mr F. The report states the record does not mention rape. The investigating officer concluded this complaint was not upheld because records made at the time did not support Miss X’s recollection.
48. The second stage 2 report also states the investigating officer had not read the first stage 2 report.

Finding

49. Given the second investigating officer had not read the first stage 2 report he was not in a position to identify and follow up on any inconsistencies between the two interviews, although it was open to the stage 3 panel to do so.
50. The real difficulty here was the conflict between the recollections of Miss X and the officers, which could not be resolved. On balance, I do not consider the inconsistencies identified affected the outcome, nor that the investigation was flawed as a result of the inconsistencies not being explored.

(f) Failure to interview a key witness

51. Miss X said she asked the Council to interview a key witness, officer 3, a domestic abuse worker, but it failed to do so.
52. The Council said the investigation was carried out by an independent investigator and it had no input into decisions about who was interviewed. It also said Miss X has not raised this with the second investigator who reinvestigated four of the complaints.

Finding

53. I have not been able to establish why officer 3 was not interviewed, nor that this was raised by Miss X during the complaints process. Given the lapse of time since the events complained about, I am not able to pursue this further.

(g) Out of date information in assessments

54. Miss X complained Council officers were cutting and pasting information from old assessments and court reports into new ones. She said this meant some of the information in more recent assessments was inaccurate or out of date. She felt this painted an unfairly negative picture of her.
55. The second stage 2 report sets out a number of inaccuracies in an assessment dated January 2018, which included a suggestion that Miss X was suffering from mental health issues and concerns about drug use, which the investigating officer found were out of date. He also found information about Miss X’s history growing up was recorded in the wrong section, and he upheld a complaint about a subjective comment made by officer 1. Although not all of the complaints about the assessment were upheld, the stage 3 panel considered enough of them were upheld to justify finding the complaint was upheld overall. It recommended the Council review its format for assessments.
56. The Council apologised for this in November 2019. It explained it had already reviewed the format for assessments since the assessment completed in January 2018.
57. In response to my enquiries, the Council confirmed the assessment did not lead it to make any adverse decisions nor was it provided to the court in connection with the private law case.

Finding

58. The inaccuracies caused Miss X distress. The Council accepted the finding and recommendations in relation to the assessment and it has apologised.

(h) Information shared inappropriately

59. Miss X told the second stage 3 panel the Council had failed to redact personal information from assessments carried out in 2018. She says sharing this information with Mr F put her at risk.
60. The Council said:
• the assessments included the information needed to comply with statutory guidance on children’s assessments;
• no personal information was included that the other parent would not already be aware of, such as a confidential address; and
• there was no evidence that sharing the assessments placed Miss X at additional risk.

Finding

61. I have reviewed the five assessments carried out in 2018, which contain information that is relevant to assessments of the children. There is no information that would, on the face of it, put Miss X at risk. The assessments were shared with both parents in accordance with normal practice. The Council was not at fault.

(i) Information shared with the school about allegations

62. Miss X says a social worker, officer 4, told the older children’s schools it had received a report from one of the children that she had abused them. She says the child later admitted this was not true but the Council did not tell the schools the complaint was withdrawn. She thinks the schools continued to believe she was an abuser, and this has caused her considerable distress.
63. The Council has no record of any such report being shared with the older children’s schools. Safeguarding leads from both schools were part of a meeting in May 2018 to discuss concerns about the older children. The record shows the Council was concerned about the impact of the relationship between Miss X and Mr F on their children, and an allegation made against Mr F by a third party. There is no mention of an allegation about Miss X. The outcome of that meeting was the case was closed.

Finding

64. The Council has no record of reporting an allegation to the older child’s school. However, both schools were aware the Council had concerns about the children, which were discussed at a meeting in May 2018. This was in accordance with normal practice in such cases. Given the lapse of time since the incident complained of, and the lack of evidence available as a result, I cannot pursue this further.

Implementation of recommendations

65. I considered whether the Council had complied with the recommendations made during the statutory complaints process.
66. The Council had already reviewed and changed its assessment format when the stage 3 panel recommended this. It considered whether there was any further action it could take about the school’s failure to participate in the process but concluded it had no power to compel the school to do so. However, it says if this issue arises again in future it will encourage the school to participate in the process.

Agreed action

67. The Council has already apologised for the failings identified in the statutory complaints process, except for complaint (c).
68. The Council will, within one month of the date of the final decision;
• apologise for referring to the historical abuse as “alleged” even after the perpetrator was convicted;
• pay Miss X £600 for the injustice caused by the delays in the complaints process, the use of the term “alleged” after the perpetrator was convicted, and the inaccuracies in the January 2018 assessment; and
• place a copy of the final decision statement in relevant files to ensure officers working with the family in future are aware of the failings identified through the complaints process and this investigation, to reduce the risk of repeating them.

With its comments on my draft decision the Council has provided evidence that it had paid Miss X the £300 it offered during its complaints handling process. Therefore, it only needs to pay a further £300 following this final decision.

69. The Council will, within three months of the date of the final decision, review its process to ensure that investigations using the children’s statutory complaints process are completed within the statutory timescales.

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Final decision

70. I have completed my investigation. I have found fault leading to personal injustice. I have recommended action to remedy that injustice and prevent recurrence of the fault.
71. Under the information sharing agreement between the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman and the Office for Standards in Education, Children’s Services and Skills (Ofsted), we will share this decision with Ofsted.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman