Summary: We have upheld Mrs X’s complaint about the Council’s refusal to consider her concerns about its failure to protect her from harm when she was a child. The Council has now agreed to consider whether it should investigate Mrs X’s complaint under the statutory complaint procedure. This provides a proportionate remedy for the injustice caused.

The complaint

1. Mrs X complains the Council has refused to consider her concerns about its failure to protect her from harm when she was a Looked After Child from 1994 onwards. She also complains the Council failed to safeguard her children from 2000 onwards. She says the Council failed to take account of her young age, significant trauma and mental capacity to understand the impact of the events when they occurred. She believes these factors prevented her from complaining with the expected timescale of 12 months.

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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 provide a free service but must use public money carefully. We may decide not to start or continue with an investigation if we are satisfied with the actions an organisation has taken or proposes to take. (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(7), as amended)

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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. If we investigated this complaint, we would be likely to find fault with the Council. This is because it has failed to properly consider whether it should exercise discretion to investigate Mrs X’s late complaint under section 3.3 of the Statutory Procedure for Children Social Care complaints (Getting the Best from Complaints). This says councils have discretion to accept complaints made more than one year after the events occurring, taking the following factors into account:

• the complainant’s vulnerability (at the time of events and after);
• is there still a benefit to the complainant in proceeding;
• is there likely to be sufficient access to information or individuals involved at the time, to enable an effective and fair investigation of the complaint; and,
• should action be taken in light of human rights based legislation.

6. We therefore asked the Council to reconsider its decision not to investigate Miss X’s complaint, ensuring it took account of the above factors in reaching its decision.

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Agreed action

7. To its credit the Council has agreed to resolve this complaint. Within one month of this final decision, the Council has agreed to:

• make a written apology to Mrs X; and,
• reconsider its decision about refusing to carry out an investigation into Mrs X’s complaints applying the criteria set out in section 3.3 of the guidance ‘Getting the best from complaints’ Social Care Complaints and Representations for Children, Young People and Others.

8. The Council should send us evidence to show it has obtained details of Mrs X’s specific complaints, its reviewed decision, evidencing proper consideration given to all Mrs X’s circumstances against the guidance.

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Final decision

9. We have upheld this complaint because the Council has agreed to resolve the complaint early by providing a proportionate remedy for the injustice caused to Mrs X.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman