Summary: We will not investigate this complaint about child protection action by the Council. There is not enough evidence of fault causing injustice by the Council to warrant investigation.

The complaint

1. Miss X said the Council had treated her and her mother badly. She said it made her children subject to child protection plans as a result of hearsay and wrongly claimed a tik-tok video was evidence. She said social workers examined her children in school without her permission and failed to turn up to appointments.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

2. The Ombudsman investigates complaints about ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’, which we call ‘fault’. We must also consider whether any fault has had an adverse impact on the person making the complaint, which we call ‘injustice’. We provide a free service, but must use public money carefully. We do not start or may decide not to continue with an investigation if we decide:

• there is not enough evidence of fault to justify investigating, or
• any injustice is not significant enough to justify our involvement.

(Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6))

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How I considered this complaint

3. I considered information provided by the complainant and the Council.
4. I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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My assessment

5. A confidential copy of the record of the initial child protection conference provided by the Council shows the tik-tok video was not the only reason for the decision the children should be subject to child protection plans. Given the information disclosed to the Council, its decision was a matter of judgement, not fault.
6. It is not fault for a social worker to see a child without a parent’s permission if the social worker believes the child might be at risk of harm. Given the content of the social care records concerning historic and recent matters, it was not fault for the social worker to form the view that Miss X’s children might be at risk of harm.
7. Any injustice to the family from any missed meetings is not enough on its own to warrant investigation.

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Final decision

8. We will not investigate Miss X’s complaint because:

• There is not enough evidence of fault in the way the Council reached its child protection decision to warrant investigation; and
• There is not enough evidence of injustice to the family from any missed meetings to warrant investigation.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman