Summary: Mr D complains about the outcome of an investigation into a complaint he made against the Council’s Children and Family services. We do not propose to reach different findings, as there is no or insufficient evidence of fault by the Council causing an injustice to Mr D.

The complaint

1. I have called the complainant ‘Mr D’. He complains about the outcome of an investigation into a complaint he made against the Council’s Children and Family services. He also complains the Council has obtained an injunction against him limiting his contact with it. Mr D considers the Council’s involvement in his family life and the injunction both follow complaints he has made about his children’s school. He does not consider the Council has acted properly in response to these.
2. Mr D says the Council’s involvement in his family life has unreasonably restricted his access to his children.

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What I have investigated

3. I have investigated how the Council considered Mr D’s complaint made in December 2018. I have not investigated the injunction the Council has obtained against Mr D. Nor can I investigate the complaint Mr D has about the actions of his children’s school. I explain my reasons at the end of this decision statement.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

4. 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)
5. We cannot investigate complaints about what happens in schools. (Local Government Act 1974, Schedule 5, paragraph 5(b), as amended)
6. 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)
7. 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 may decide not to start or continue with an investigation if we believe the fault has not caused injustice to the person who complained; the injustice is not significant enough to justify our involvement or it is unlikely we could add to any previous investigation by the Council. (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended)
8. 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

9. Before issuing this decision I considered:

• Mr D’s complaint as he presented it verbally to this office.
• Documents forming an audit trail of Mr D’s complaint which pre-dated this investigation.
• Further information provided by the Council in response to my written enquiries.
• Relevant law and procedures as referred to below.

10. I also sent both Mr D and the Council a copy of a draft decision statement setting out my thinking about the complaint. The Council said it had no comments on the draft. Mr D did not respond when invited to comment.

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What I found

The Children and Families Complaint procedure

11. The Children’s Act 1989 sets out the complaint procedure where a child or young person is unhappy with the actions of Council’s children’s services. This includes complaints made on behalf of a child or young person. Regulations and guidance contained in a publication entitled “Getting the Best from Complaints: Social Care Complaints and Representations for Children, Young People and Others” underpin the procedure.
12. The statutory procedure has three stages. Stage one gives a council chance to resolve a complaint informally. If it cannot do this, then at stage two it must appoint an Investigating Officer (IO) and an Independent Person (IP), who oversees the investigation. The IO produces a report with their findings and the IP produces a report commenting on the investigation. The Council must then respond to that.
13. If a complainant remains unhappy they can then ask for a stage three review. A panel made up of three people independent of the Council hears the review. The panel will consider the grounds for dissatisfaction with the outcome of the stage two investigation and may recommend the Council take further action.

Mr D’s complaint – Stage One

14. Mr D first complained to the Council in December 2018. Council social services had become involved in his family life. The Council had placed his children on child protection plans because it considered them at risk of significant harm. Mr D said that social workers wrongly presented him in their reports as being violent or aggressive. He said they had wrongly pressured his ex-partner to take out an injunction against him and wrongly advised the children’s mother he should only have supervised contact with his children. He wanted to have unsupervised contact and have more information about the Council’s continuing involvement in his children’s life.
15. The Council replied in January 2019. It recognised that its social worker had found Mr D aggressive and intimidating towards them. It said other professionals had recorded similar comments about Mr D. It noted occasions where Mr D had been asked to leave meetings because of his presentation. It said that Mr D knew his children were on child protection plans because of concerns they had witnessed domestic violence between him and his ex-partner. The Council said it had encouraged his ex-partner to take measures to protect herself and the children. A Child Protection Conference considered only supervised contact appropriate. This had an Independent Reviewing Officer in the chair.
16. The Council noted that Mr D could not attend core group meetings held to review the children’s progress against the outcomes in their child protection plans. This is because the Council held them at the children’s school which Mr D could not enter because the school had banned him from doing so. It said that going forward the children’s social worker would contact Mr D before and after core group meetings to “share information and gather your views”.

Mr D’s complaint – Stage Two

17. Mr D was unhappy with the response to his complaint. The Council agreed to arrange for a Stage Two investigation in line with the procedure I explained above. Mr D agreed the complaint had five parts to it. These were that:

• The children’s social worker lied about him in meetings, portraying him as violent and aggressive.
• It had pressured his ex-partner into taking out an injunction against him.
• It held meetings at the school he could not attend.
• The Council wrongly considered he had fanatical views because of his race and religion.
• A named Council officer had failed to contact him despite his attempts to speak to them.

18. The Council asked an independent investigator to act as the Investigating Officer (IO). They produced their report in March 2019. A separate Independent Person supported it. The report did not uphold any of Mr D’s complaint. I summarise its reasons as follows:

• That social work staff had formed their judgments about Mr D based on reliable sources. For example, the records of multiple police call outs to disputes between Mr D and his partner. There was a history of Mr D having mental health and substance abuse issues. Third parties reported Mr D’s aggressive behaviour in his dispute with his children’s school.
• The Council had reasonable grounds to consider Mr D’s children at risk of harm. It had placed reasonable expectations on parents about how to minimize that harm through supervised contact. It said the Council should only support unsupervised contact if Mr D co-operated with a parenting assessment and this found no risk in such contact. He had, so far, not co-operated with this. The Council had a duty to promote Mr D’s contact with his children but must balance that with the need to safeguard his children.
• The Council made reasonable efforts to involve Mr D in the core group and child protection meetings. He had to leave both meetings previously because of his conduct.
• The records did not show the Council regarded Mr D as a fanatic. But the Council had concerns about his mental health shared by other professionals. They noted Mr D‘s activity on social media and this may have led to contact with individuals or groups with extremist beliefs. They had concerns Mr D could face exploitation due to his vulnerability.
• The Council officer had not called Mr D as expected with information about his children. But Mr D had obtained the information he sought from the police.

Mr D’s complaint – Stage Three

19. Mr D was unhappy with the outcome of this investigation. He asked that it go to a review panel. The Council arranged the panel in May 2019 and gave Mr D over two weeks notice of the hearing.
20. At short notice Mr D said he could not attend as he had another appointment. The panel decided to hear the case in his absence, given that Mr D could have alerted it sooner to his absence. The review panel considered the Stage Two findings and found no reason to change them.

My findings

21. My role is not to re-investigate Mr D’s complaint from scratch. Instead I have focused on:
1. If there is any evidence of fault in the complaint procedure followed by the Council.
2. If there is any evidence which should have led to a different outcome to the complaint.
3. If there is anything further I can add to the previous investigation. This takes account of how Mr D has expressed his continuing concerns to us. Also, how the Council has put into action commitments to improve communications with Mr D.

I will address these in turn.

The complaint procedure

22. On the first of these points I am satisfied the Council followed proper procedure in how it investigated Mr D’s complaint. It sent a first response in a reasonable timescale to Mr D. It engaged with the substance of his complaint and explained how its social work staff had formed their views about him. It recognised he could not take part fully in core group meetings and offered to consult him further. There was no fault in this part of the procedure.
23. When Mr D expressed unhappiness with the reply the Council properly referred his complaint for a Stage Two investigation. This involved an independent investigation. I am satisfied from the IO’s report that their investigation was thorough. The report runs to over 30 pages and addresses each part of Mr D’s complaint in some detail. The IO had full access to all relevant records and personnel. They interviewed key officers. The report also explains the IO’s efforts to engage with Mr D during their investigation. There was no fault in this part of the procedure either.
24. I also considered the review panel could reasonably consider Mr D’s complaint at Stage Three without him being present. There is nothing to contradict the explanation in the notes that Mr D only signalled he could not attend at short notice. While it would be preferable for the review board to have heard Mr D’s views on why he disagreed with the IO report, it could choose to continue in his absence. It still gave further independent scrutiny to his complaint.

The findings from the investigation

25. I can find no reason why the investigation of Mr D’s complaint should have come to any fundamentally different conclusions. I have focused on the IO report as this is the most comprehensive document. I find it clearly sets out why the Council had recorded Mr D as aggressive at times. It also explained why it had concerns he may be exposed to radicalisation and explained why the complaint about the named officer could not be upheld. I can find no suggestion of any contrary evidence which could have led to any other conclusions.
26. I have given particular attention to Mr D’s complaint about contact with his children, as this has motivated Mr D’s continuing with his complaint. I consider the IO’s report correctly identified the balance the Council must strike between wanting to promote contact between children and their parents and needing to safeguard children from harm. The Children’s Act 1989 says the Council’s overarching duty is to safeguard the interests of the child.
27. In this case the Council advanced reasons why it considered it was in the interests of Mr D’s children that they only had supervised contact with him. I do not need to repeat all the concerns the Council had for their welfare. Mr D will be familiar with these from the Council’s communications with him and what is in the IO report. But I note the children would not have been on child protection plans if the Council did not consider they were at risk of ‘significant harm’. It had reason to think that allowing Mr D unsupervised access could place the children at continued risk of such harm. Its child protection plans therefore sort to prevent that and it asked both parents to agree undertakings alongside the child protection plans.
28. The Council explained to Mr D and Mr D’s ex-partner the potential consequences of acting contrary to the child protection plans. It could not prevent Mr D having unsupervised access. But the Council made clear that it would consider legal proceedings to take the children into care in such circumstances.
29. It follows the Council would want to do all it could to influence events to remove the significant harm it considered the children faced. It is reasonable for a council to act in this manner so long as it has sound reasons for considering significant risk exists and has presented information properly to child protection conferences. There is nothing in the complaint records or the extra records I have seen that leads me to think this is not the case.
30. I can understand therefore why the investigation of Mr D’s complaint has found the Council could advance sound reasons for its approach towards contact between him and his children. I accept Mr D disagrees with that judgment. But I cannot find fault because of disagreement alone. I support the findings of the previous investigation into this complaint.
31. The only part of the previous investigation into Mr D’s complaint I have some concern about is that concerned with Mr D’s involvement in meetings. The IO report recognised Mr D could not attend core group meetings (to review progress against the child protection plans) at the children’s school. They suggested the Council should still involve Mr D in the meeting procedure by collecting his views. Or they could invite his attendance via phone or arrange the meetings elsewhere. Yet they were not clear if the Council was at fault for not doing this before and made no clear recommendations. Their report also overlooked the Council’s commitment given in response to Mr D’s original complaint. It did not check if the Council had kept its word on communication with Mr D around core group meetings.
32. However, I did not consider that should lead me to uphold this part of the complaint. The IO was also clear that core group meetings needed to focus on the welfare of Mr D’s children. It made sense to hold them at a setting where teachers and the children’s mother could attend. I considered the IO’s comments intended to encourage best practice by the Council. And their finding this part of the complaint could not be upheld was not one where I would reach a different view.

Further considerations

33. Given the Council said it would review how it communicated with Mr D after January 2019, I have reviewed the core group and child protection conference minutes from then. I do not have the complete record as some of the individual core group records omit the meeting minutes. However, the records show clearly that during 2019 the Council remained in communication with Mr D around his children’s welfare. Summaries show a changing pattern of involvement by Mr D. At times the record describes him as engaging with services and at other times he is not. It is evident that problems with supervised contact sessions led the Council to obtain its injunction against Mr D.
34. I did not consider there was enough evidence to show the Council consistently sought to involve Mr D in the ongoing child protection work it undertook. But I also considered the evidence showed that Mr D remained resistant to that involvement and non-cooperative at times. That being so, I did not consider that even if I found fault that I could say this caused Mr D any injustice. Because I came to the view that Mr D continued to find it hard to accept why the Council had chosen to interfere in his family life (something which I have explained I have no grounds to criticise). I did not consider greater attempts by the Council to involve Mr D would therefore have led to him to engage more in return.

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Final decision

35. For reasons set out above I do not uphold this complaint. I have completed my investigation satisfied with the Council’s actions.

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Parts of the complaint that I did not investigate

36. I could not investigate the Council obtaining an injunction against Mr D restricting his contact with its offices and its officers. This is for the reason set out in paragraph 4. I have no power to investigate decisions taken by the Courts, including the making of injunctions.
37. I could not investigate any complaint about the school which Mr D’s children attend. It is clear from the documents I have read that Mr D has a long-standing dispute with the school about how it reacted to alleged racist bullying experienced by one of his children. But this is an internal school matter which I cannot investigate for the reasons set out in paragraph 5. The restriction on my investigation also extends to considering how the Council, as the local education authority, responded to any contacts from Mr D asking it to intervene in that matter.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman