Summary: Mr X complained about the Council’s failure to protect his now adult children in the past and its failure to tell him when the children went into foster care. We cannot investigate a complaint on behalf of Mr X’s children because we do not have their consent. We will not investigate the failure to keep Mr X informed. That is because it is unlikely we could add to the Council’s previous investigation as the Council has already upheld the complaint and apologised to him.

The complaint

1. Mr X complained on his own behalf and on behalf of his two adult children. He said the Council failed to protect the children from 2006 onwards from mental and physical abuse and will not now investigate a complaint about this. He said the failure led to both children going into foster care. He said he was not told when the children became looked after children. He said the children are still damaged by what happened.

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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 could add to any previous investigation by the Council. (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. The law says we cannot normally investigate a complaint unless we are satisfied the council knows about the complaint and has had an opportunity to investigate and reply. (Local Government Act 1974, section 26(5))

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How I considered this complaint

5. I considered the information in Mr X’s complaint and from the Council’s complaints procedure.
6. Mr X had an opportunity to comment on my draft decision. I considered his comments before making this final decision.

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What I found

What happened

7. In 2020 Mr X found out about events which affected his children after he left the family home fourteen years earlier. He complained to the Council about its failure to protect the children and that the Council had not told him when the children became went into foster care.
8. The Council took five months to issue its full response to Mr X at Stage 1 of its complaints procedure. It apologised for its delay. The Council upheld Mr X’s complaint that it did not tell him when one child went into foster care and that it did not keep him updated about the child’s plans. The Council said it would review its practice in future as a result of the complaint.
9. The Council gave brief information about what had happened in the family and said the other child had stayed at the family home.
10. The Council did not uphold Mr X’s complaint about a failure to protect the children. It told Mr X it would not investigate this part of the complaint further in the complaints procedure because the children were now adults. The Council told him he could support them making their own complaints or they could be supported by advocates. The Council also advised that if, as Mr X said, the adult children wanted a criminal investigation into the alleged abuser, that would be a matter for the police. It said it would make its records available to a police investigation if requested.

Analysis

11. Through the complaints procedure the Council has accepted and apologised for not telling Mr X one of his children became a looked after child, and for not then keeping him informed. It is unlikely we could now add to this so we should not investigate this part of the complaint.
12. Mr X’s children are now adults. We cannot investigate complaints on their behalf without their consent. If we had their consent it is unlikely we would investigate at the moment because the Council itself has not yet had the opportunity to investigate complaints submitted by them.

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Final decision

13. We cannot investigate complaints on behalf of Mr X’s adult children because we do not have their consent to do so. We will not investigate his own complaint because it is unlikely we could add to the previous investigation by the Council.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman