Summary: Ms C, who was a child in the Council’s care, says the Council is at fault for offering to fund her accommodation at university only if she lives with her former foster family from whom she is estranged. The Council is at fault. It cannot insist Ms C continues to live with the foster family against her will. This is an injustice. The Council has a duty to provide accommodation while she is studying. It should fund alternative accommodation for her.

The complaint

1. The complainant, who I have called Ms C says the Council has gone back on an agreement it made to fund her accommodation while she is at university. The Council says it will fund her accommodation if she lives with her former foster family under a ‘staying put agreement’ but Ms C says she should not be required to do so because she has fallen out with them.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

2. We investigate complaints about ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’. I have used the word fault to refer to these. We must also consider whether any fault has had an adverse impact on the person making the complaint. I refer to this as ‘injustice’. If there has been fault which has caused an injustice, we may suggest a remedy. (Local Government Act 1974, sections 26(1) and 26A(1), as amended)
3. If we are satisfied with a council’s actions or proposed actions, we can complete our investigation and issue a decision statement. (Local Government Act 1974, section 30(1B) and 34H(i), as amended)

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How I considered this complaint

4. I spoke to Ms C. I wrote an enquiry letter to the Council. I considered the relevant law and guidance.
5. I sent my draft decision to Ms C and the Council and invited their comments.
6. Under the information sharing agreement between the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman and the Office for Standards in Education, Children’s Services and Skills (Ofsted), we will share this decision with Ofsted.

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What I found

7. The Children and Families Act 2014 introduced ‘staying put agreements’. The Act required councils to facilitate and arrange these agreements which would extend looked after young people’s relationships with their foster carers beyond childhood up to the age of 21 or, in certain circumstances, longer, if the young person and the foster carers wish it.
8. The Council’s ‘Staying Put’ policy says its aim is to ‘enable young people to build on and nurture their attachments to their carers so that they can move to independence at their own pace and be supported to make the transition to adulthood in a more gradual way, just like young people who can rely on their own families’ and ‘to respond to the wishes of young people to be able to have a more gradual path towards independent living’.

Pathway plans

9. Councils have a duty to act as if they were parents to children who are in their care and towards young adults who were formerly in their care.
10. Among their duties is to create a ‘pathway plan’ for such children and young adults which they must review regularly. The plan should set out a plan to achieve the young person’s potential over the coming months and years and say what the Council will do to help achieve it.

The Children (Leaving Care) Act 2000

11. The Children (Leaving Care) Act 2000 s.23C says that councils have ongoing duties to young adults aged 18 to 21, or 18 to 25 if they are in full-time education, who were formerly in their care. These children are known as ‘former relevant children’. Councils must:
1. take reasonable steps to keep in touch with them;
2. appoint a personal advisor for them, if they want one;
3. keep their pathway plan under regular review;
4. provide assistance to them, in a monetary form if necessary, to allow them to live near the place where they are working or seeking work or where they are receiving education or training; and
5. provide such other assistance as may be necessary.

What happened

12. Ms C came to the UK aged 6 as an unaccompanied minor in 2002. She arrived at an airport in the Council’s area and was looked after by its children’s services. She was placed in a foster placement in a nearby municipal borough. The placement was successful. Ms C remained there throughout school achieving excellent GCSE and A level results.
13. Records of care planning meetings in 2013 and 2014 show the Council intended to fund Ms C through university and assured her it would. She applied to university to study medicine. A 2016 document shows the Council intended to continue support throughout her six-year course which will end in June 2022.
14. When Ms C turned 18 in 2014, she entered into a ‘staying put arrangement’ and continued to live with her former foster carers. However, by August 2018, when she was 21, her relationship with them had worsened.
15. In August 2018, Ms C’s Council-appointed personal advisor told the children’s services Ms C was unhappy with the arrangement and wished to move. An officer phoned the foster parents who were surprised by this. Ms C, the former foster carers and the Council held a meeting and discussed their differences. Ms C said this had somewhat cleared the air. However, she has not changed her mind about her desire to leave the former foster carers’ home.
16. The Council then informed her it would withdraw payment for her accommodation within 28 days because the staying put arrangement had broken down. It says it will continue to provide other support while she is at university but will not fund her accommodation in halls. It has since said in complaint responses that it is happy to fund her accommodation in the staying put agreement but not otherwise.
17. Ms C complained to the Council. A senior officer replied saying:
1. the Council had agreed to support her throughout her university education but had not said precisely how it would provide this support;
2. since then, ‘the legislation that enabled you to ‘Stay Put’ with your foster carer was enacted into law in May 2014;
3. after that, the Council agreed in a pathway plan update to accommodate her under a staying put agreement; and
4. the Council had not made any agreement to provide any other type of accommodation.
18. Ms C escalated her complaint to stage two without success. She came to the Ombudsman.

Was there fault causing injustice?

19. I find the Council was at fault. It says it has agreed to fund Ms C’s accommodation if she lives with her former foster carers but will not otherwise do so. This decision does not accord with the intentions of the Staying Put programme, or its duties under the Children (Leaving Care) Act 2000.
20. Staying Put Arrangements allow formerly fostered children to remain with their former foster parents in an ongoing relationship if both parties want the relationship to continue. They do not oblige formerly fostered children to reside with their former foster parents against their wishes.
21. In this case, Ms C does not want to continue to live at her former foster home. The Council has suggested in its complaint responses that Ms C’s reasons for wanting to live elsewhere are trivial. This is not a relevant consideration. Neither is it relevant who is to blame for any disagreements between them. The only important factor is whether she wishes to live there or not. And she does not.
22. The Council has a duty under the Children (Leaving Care) Act 2000 to provide accommodation to Ms C at a place convenient for her education. It does not have to be in university halls though, if, as Ms C says, she has a substantially reduced rent in halls because she was formerly in care, reduced travel costs and can live there 51 weeks per year, this may prove a sensible solution.

Injustice

23. The Council has continued to pay for Ms C’s accommodation in halls throughout the 2018/19 academic year although under protest. This has reduced the injustice Ms C has suffered due to Council fault.
24. Nonetheless, the distress caused by the uncertainty over her accommodation and the time taken in pursuing this complaint were both caused by the Council. I have recommended the Council pay her a sum in recognition of this injustice.

Agreed action

25. The Council has agreed, as soon as possible after the date of this decision and in any event within three weeks, to:
1. apologise to Ms C;
2. find and fund accommodation to allow her to continue her studies; and
3. pay Ms C £200 in recognition of the distress caused and the time taken in pursuing this complaint.

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Final decision

26. I have considered all the information provided by the Council and Ms C and have decided the Council was at fault. The Council has agreed a remedy. I have closed my investigation.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman