Summary: We will not investigate this complaint that the Council was at fault in the course of child protection action and in its response to the complainant’s subsequent complaint. The complaint is late and there are no grounds for us to investigate it now.

The complaint

1. The complainant, Mrs X, complains that the Council was at fault in the course of child protection action relating to her family, and that the impact of this fault has not been appropriately recognised in the outcome of her formal complaint to the Council.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

2. We cannot investigate late complaints unless we decide there are good reasons. Late complaints are when someone takes more than 12 months to complain to us about something a council has done. (Local Government Act 1974, sections 26B and 34D, as amended)

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How I considered this complaint

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

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My assessment

5. Mrs X says that the Council has been at fault in its actions towards her family over a period of more than a decade. Her complaint relates to a child protection enquiry carried out in 2019 under section 47 of the Children Act 1989. She says she subsequently made a Subject Access Request which identified significant fault in the conduct of the section 47 enquiry.
6. Mrs X made a formal complaint to the Council in 2020 which she says was upheld. The complaint procedure concluded in April 2024. The Council apologised for the fault on its part and offered symbolic payments, as well as reimbursement of some costs Mrs X had incurred. Mrs X says the outcome has not properly addressed all aspects of her complaint and the symbolic payments are not proportionate to the injustice her family has suffered.
7. We will not investigate Mrs X’s complaint because it is late. Late complaints are when someone takes more than 12 months to complain to us about something a council has done. The events about which Mrs X complains took place in 2019 and she complained about them in 2022. The complaint is therefore late.
8. The Ombudsman has the discretion to accept late complaints where it is appropriate to do so. That is not the case here. The Council’s complaint procedure took more than two years to conclude and it was not reasonable to expect Mrs X to come to the Ombudsman while the procedure was underway. However, there was a gap of more than two years between the events about which she complained and the point at which she complained about them.
9. It is also the case that Mrs X did not come to the Ombudsman promptly once the complaint procedure ended, delaying the complaint by a further 10 months. It is not therefore appropriate for us to use our discretion to consider this late complaint and we will not do so.

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Final decision

10. We will not investigate Mrs X’s complaint because it is late and there are no grounds for us to consider it now.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman