Summary: We will not investigate this complaint about child protection action relating to the complainant’s children and about how the Council handled his subsequent complaint. This is because we would not achieve anything significant by doing so.

The complaint

1. The complainant, who I will refer to as Mr X, complains that the Council’s social workers were at fault in the course of child protection action. He further complains that the consideration of his complaint was flawed and was subject to unreasonable delay.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

2. We investigate complaints about ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’, which we call ‘fault’. We must also consider whether any fault has had an adverse effect 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 an investigation if we decide the tests set out in our Assessment Code are not met. (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 considered information provided by the complainant and the Council.
5. I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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My assessment

6. Mr X’s daughter lives with her mother. She has been the subject of child protection action and private law proceedings. Mr X says that, during the process, the Council’s social workers have failed to take account of his views. He complains that they have made false statements and have acted with bias against him. He further complains that they failed to act on his request to carry out an assessment of his son. Mr X says that, as a result of the Council’s actions, he has missed out on significant periods of his daughter’s life.
7. Mr X made a formal complaint which has completed the three stages of the Council’s corporate complaints procedure and has been substantially upheld. The Council has made an apology and offered a symbolic financial remedy for the failures in its complaint handling. Mr X is not satisfied with the outcome. He complains that the complaint process was subject to unreasonable delay and that the outcome does nothing to remedy the emotional damage caused to him and other family members.
8. The Ombudsman will not investigate this complaint because we cannot achieve anything significant by doing so. The evidence shows that Mr X’s daughter’s care has been considered in court and that there has been a court order relating to her care and contact in place since 2021. By law, the Ombudsman cannot investigate what happens in Court. This restriction applies, not only to the Court’s decision, but to all matters inextricably linked to it. This includes the evidence and reports produced by the Council and considered by the Court.
9. The effect of this legal restriction is that matters relating to the care of and contact with Mr X’s daughter do not fall to the Ombudsman to investigate. If Mr X is unhappy with his level of contact with his daughter, or believes the order is not being complied with, his recourse is to go back to court.
10. It is not a good use of public money to investigate how a complaint has been handled where the substantive matters do not themselves fall to be investigated, and we will not normally do so. Neither will we do so where a complaint has already been substantially upheld. Both of these apply in this case and our intervention is not warranted.

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Final decision

11. We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint because we would not achieve anything significant by doing so.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman