Summary: Mr X complains the Council has not dealt properly with care arrangements for his son Y. The Ombudsman will not investigate Mr X’s complaint because we cannot look at what happened in court and the complaints process was not flawed.

The complaint

1. Mr X complains the Council has not dealt properly with care arrangements for his son Y because:
• It wrongly took care proceedings in court about Y and withdrew allegations during proceedings.
• The investigation of his complaint was flawed because officers weren’t interviewed, there was a conflict of interest, the investigator wasn’t independent and the investigator was misled.
• The Council haven’t apologised properly; and
• It has not paid his full travel expenses.
2. Mr X says he has suffered distress anxiety and depression, he has been unable to work, has incurred travel expenses and he has lost earnings.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

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)
4. We can decide whether to start or discontinue an investigation into a complaint within our jurisdiction. (Local Government Act 1974, sections 24A(6) and 34B(8), as amended)
5. We investigate complaints about ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’. In this statement, 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’. We provide a free service, but must use public money carefully. We may decide not to start or continue with an investigation if we believe:

• it is unlikely we would find fault, or
• it is unlikely we could add to any previous investigation by the Council, or
• we cannot achieve the outcome someone wants.

(Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended)

6. 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

7. I have spoken to Mr X about his complaint and considered the information he has provided to the Ombudsman. I have also considered documents from the statutory complaints process.
8. Mr X and the Council had an opportunity to comment on my draft decision. I considered any comments received before making a final decision.

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What I found

Children’s services complaints

9. The law sets out a three-stage procedure for councils to follow when looking at complaints about children’s social care services. At stage 2 of this procedure, the Council appoints an Independent Investigator and an Independent Person (who is responsible for overseeing the investigation). If a complainant is unhappy with the outcome of the stage 2 investigation, they can ask for a stage 3 review. If a council has investigated something under this procedure, the Ombudsman would not normally re-investigate it. However, he may look at whether a council properly considered the findings and recommendations of the independent investigation.
10. There are time limits within which the Council should complete its investigations. At stage 2 the investigation of the complaint should take no longer than 25 days or 65 days where the complaint is more complex. The timescales only apply from the date when the complaint and scope of investigation is agreed with the complainant where the complaint has been submitted orally.
11. If a complaint goes to stage 3 then the panel’s consideration of the complaint should take no longer than 35 days and the Council has a further 15 days to respond to the findings.

What happened

12. In February 2020, Mr X complained to the Council regarding his son Y. The Council responded at stage one of the complaints process in March 2020.
13. Mr X told the Council he wanted to escalate his complaint to stage two. The Council told Mr X that there would be a delay due to the impact of Covid 19. The Council appointed an independent investigator who contacted Mr X in August 2020. Mr X’s complaint was:
• Staff were dishonest resulting in Y being taken into care;
• Court proceedings should not have been pursued;
• Y was physically and mentally abused in care;
• Y received poor levels of care and stimulation in care;
• A solicitor had a conflict of interest;
• The process had been delayed; and
• Travel expenses had not been repaid.

The Council did not uphold any part of Mr X’s complaint and issued its stage two investigation report to Mr X in November 2020. It did not investigate Mr X’s complaint about a solicitor’s conflict of interest.

14. Mr X asked the Council to progress his complaint to stage three. A stage three hearing was held in December 2020. At the hearing Mr X stated that he remained dissatisfied because:
• He remained unhappy about the actions of a social worker, and that they had not been interviewed;
• He was concerned that Y’s solicitor may have influenced a decision about costs;
• He did not believe the Council had apologised properly; and
• He believed the stage two investigator was not independent.
15. Notes of the stage three review panel show Mr X raised issues concerning:
• a number of officers who were not interviewed by the stage two investigation;
• the employment status of one e-employee of the Council;
• a conflict of interest by Y’s solicitor prevented an application for costs;
• misleading information regarding Y’s care and the contradictory conclusions of an OFSTED report
• wanting an apology for the actions of staff which resulted in Y being taken into care; and
• the independence of the stage two investigating officer.
16. The review panel report did not uphold Mr X’s complaints that he had raised at the panel meeting and declined to make a finding concerning any legal practice issues.

Analysis

17. The main part of Mr X’s complaint concerns the decision to take court proceedings and the withdrawal of a list of concerns during proceedings. I cannot investigate what happened in court. This is outside the Ombudsman’s jurisdiction.
18. Once a complaint has been through the statutory procedure, unless there are faults or omissions in the Council’s consideration, we will not reinvestigate the findings. The findings should be relied upon unless there are flaws in the process or it has clearly not been robust enough. I have considered Mr X’s concerns that the stage two investigation was flawed.
• Mr X was concerned that the investigation did not speak to a social worker (SW1) who he complained about. SW1 no longer worked for the Council. Mr X was unhappy that the actions taken to try to engage with SW1 were inadequate. Any involvement by SW1 would only provide information about Mr X’s main complaint. SW1 would be under no obligation to provide information to the stage two investigation. There were no concerns that the stage two investigation had inadequate access to documentation and records. On the balance of probabilities, even if SW1 had agreed to be interviewed, their involvement in the stage two investigation would not have yielded any significant additional information or changed the outcome. This does not constitute a flaw in the stage two investigation.
• Mr X was concerned the stage two investigator was not independent because he had previously worked for the Council. The stage two investigator’s employment had finished 15 years previously. This does not constitute a sufficiently proximate timeframe to compromise their independence and constitute a flaw in the stage two investigation.
• Mr X was concerned that the investigation was misled by interview evidence and did not consider the conflicting findings of an OSFTED report. The first draft of the stage two investigation report did not refer to the OFSTED report, but it was included in the final version after Mr X referred to it. It is clear the stage two investigation considered a range of evidence sources including interview records, the OFSTED report and multiple records of Child In Need meetings. When the Council became aware of the OFSTED report, the evidence was considered and integrated into the stage two investigation before the final stage two issue was issued. This does not constitute a flaw in the stage two investigation.
19. Mr X had the opportunity to raise issues he was unhappy with at the stage three panel and provide any additional evidence. He did not provide any new evidence and the meeting notes show he did not raise the issue of travel expenses.
20. Mr X told me, “I would like the remainder of my claim for travel expenses paid. They would not have been incurred had DCC not brought proceedings in the first place.” As I am unable to investigate the court proceedings themselves, I am also unable to investigate a complaint based solely on the outcome of those proceedings.
21. Mr X complains the apology made by the Council was not ‘fulsome’. Given that the Council did not uphold any of his complaint it was not apologising for any identified service failure. A general expression of concern that Mr X had complained, in the absence of an upheld complaint, would be unlikely to constitute fault or have caused any significant ongoing injustice.
22. The majority of the stage three panel notes concern the parts of Mr X’s complaint which I cannot investigate. Mr X says he did not raise some parts of his complaint during the complaints process because he thought it would be a whitewash, he was unaware what he should raise at stage three and he picked out the biggest issues he was unhappy with. Mr X was able to fully articulate his complaint for the stage two investigation and I have seen no evidence to show he would have been unable to do this at the stage three panel hearing.
23. I have decided to discontinue my investigation into Mr X’s complaint because:
• a central part of Mr X’s complaint was about the court proceedings and travel expenses which I am unable to investigate;
• the issues raised by Mr X do not demonstrate that the statutory investigation process was flawed;
• Mr X had the opportunity to raise all parts of his complaint at stage three of the process and failed to do so;
• we would be unlikely to find fault or add to the previous investigation.

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Final decision

24. The Ombudsman will not investigate this complaint.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman