Summary: We will not investigate this complaint about the Special Guardianship Order allowance paid to the complainant. This is because there is no evidence of fault on the Council’s part.

The complaint

1. The complainant, Mrs X, complains that the Council has unreasonably reduced the Special Guardianship Order (SGO) allowance payable in respect of her granddaughter.

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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 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 continue an investigation if we decide there is not enough evidence of fault to justify investigating. (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended, section 34(B))

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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. Mrs X and her husband have had care of her granddaughter since 2020. Mrs X initially fostered her granddaughter. She says she was happy to continue fostering and receiving fostering allowance but was led to believe obtaining an SGO would not disadvantage her family financially.
6. The Court granted the SGO and the Council agreed to pay non means tested SGO allowance for the first two years. When the two-year period ended and means testing was applied, Mrs X’s SGO allowance reduced significantly.
7. Mrs X regards this reduction as unreasonable. She complains that she was misled into obtaining the SGO on the basis of a ‘dummy run’ assessment which produced a much more favourable outcome. She argues that the Council should not apply means testing to the calculation of SGO allowance.
8. The Ombudsman will not investigate Mrs X’s complaint because there is no indication of fault on the Council’s part. The Council is entitled to means test SGO allowance and we cannot criticise it for doing so. It is clear that the household income on which the new assessment was based is significantly higher than that used in the ‘dummy run‘ assessment, so it is not surprising that the outcome is different. There is no basis on which to conclude that the financial assessment is inaccurate.
9. It would not be possible for us to take a definitive view on the extent to which Mrs X understood the financial implications of obtaining an SGO. But that is not a matter for the Ombudsman. There is no evidence that the Council provided her with false or misleading information and therefore no grounds for us to pursue the complaint.

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Final decision

10. We will not investigate Mrs X’s complaint because there is no indication of fault on the Council’s part.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman