Summary: We will not investigate Mr X’s complaints about a Council children services assessment. He does not have parental responsibility for the children involved. And the Information Commissioner’s Office is better placed to consider his data protection dispute.

The complaint

1. The complainant, whom I shall call Mr X, says the Council disclosed information to his partner without his consent and it carried out an assessment poorly.

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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. (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended)
3. We may investigate complaints made on behalf of someone else if they have given their consent. (Local Government Act 1974, section 26A(1), as amended)
4. We normally expect someone to refer the matter to the Information Commissioner if they have a complaint about data protection. However, we may decide to investigate if we think there are good reasons. (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended)

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How I considered this complaint

5. I considered the information Mr X provided with his complaint and the Council’s replies to him which it provided. Mr X had the opportunity to comment on a draft version of this decision.

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What I found

6. Mr X is in prison. He says the Council prevented Ms Y from seeing him.
7. Mr X told the Council concerns he had about the care of Ms Y’s children. The Council carried out an assessment. Mr X is unhappy with this assessment. He says as part of it the Council gave Ms Y information about him which he had not agreed they should.

Analysis

8. The Council is not in control of contact with prisoners. We cannot look at the prison’s actions.
9. Mr X does not have parental responsibility for the children involved in the assessment he complains about. We will not consider his complaint about this assessment because there are other people better placed to complain on the children’s behalf.
10. Parliament set up the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) to consider data protection disputes. Disclosing information about someone, to another person, can be a data protection breach. It is reasonable to expect Mr X to complain to the ICO. This is particularly because his case involves child protection which has complex data protection exemptions.

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Final decision

11. We will not investigate this complaint. This is because it is unlikely we wound find fault and the ICO is better placed.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman