Summary: We will not investigate this complaint about the Council’s decision not to consider a complaint about its child protection involvement with the complainant’s grandchildren. The is because there is no sign of fault with the Council’s decision and the substantive matter is subject to court proceedings and is therefore out of the Ombudsman’s jurisdiction.

The complaint

1. The complainants, who I will refer to as Mr & Mrs C, complain about how the Council dealt with child protection matters relating to their grandchildren, and its subsequent refusal to investigate their complaint.

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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 (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended).
3. 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)

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How I considered this complaint

4. I have considered Mr & Mrs C’s complaint and the Council’s responses. I have invited Mr & Mrs C to comment on a draft version of this decision.

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What I found

Background

5. The law sets out a three-stage procedure for councils to follow when looking at complaints about children’s social care services.
6. The Children Act 1989 Representations Procedure (England) Regulations 2006 set out details of who may complaint through the statutory procedure as well as what actions can be complained about.
7. The Regulations say complaints under the statutory complaints process may be brought by “a parent… or someone who has parental responsibility” for a child as well as “such other person as the local authority consider has sufficient interest in the child or young person’s welfare to warrant his representations being considered by them”.

What happened

8. The Council’s children’s services became involved with Mr & Mrs C’s grandchildren and subsequently produced a social work assessment. This assessment was presented to the courts during a hearing to decide upon an application for a Child Arrangements Order (CAO).
9. Mr & Mrs C complained to the Council about the contents of the assessment and about the lack of support it offered their son during the process.
10. The Council declined to investigate Mr & Mrs C’s complaint, because it did not consider that they hold sufficient interest in the children. The Council said it had reached this decision because Mr & Mrs C did not have parental responsibility for the children, did not have any caring responsibility for them and because neither of the children’s parents had provided consent for Mr & Mrs C to complain on behalf of the children.

Assessment

11. I will not investigate Mr & Mrs C’s complaint that the Council failed to investigate their complaint. This is because there is no evidence of fault in how the Council reached its decision.
12. The Council considered if Mr & Mrs C had sufficient interest in the children to represent them, and it fully explained its reasons why it did not. Mr & Mrs C may strongly disagree with this, but that does not mean the Council has done anything wrong.
13. Furthermore, I cannot investigate the substantive element of Mr & Mrs complaint. This is because it concerns matters which have been considered and decided in court. It was for the court to decide upon who the children live or have contact with, and in doing so it was presented with the assessment which Mr & Mrs C complain about. By law, we cannot consider evidence submitted to the courts, or how that evidence was produced.

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Final decision

14. We will not investigate this complaint. This is because there is insufficient evidence of fault in how the Council dealt with the matter, and because the substantive element of the complaint is subject to court proceedings.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman