Summary: We find the Council at fault for failing to consider Ms X’s request for reasonable adjustments and for failing to discuss possible reasonable adjustments when Ms X told officers she had dyslexia. We recommend the Council apologise to Ms X, consider how it communicates with her going forward, and acts to prevent recurrence.

The complaint

1. Ms X complains the Council failed to make reasonable adjustments when communicating with her. Ms X also complains about how the Council completed a court report and how it considered her complaint about this. Ms X says this has caused her stress and meant she had had to share personal information with a friend.

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What I have and have not investigated

2. I have investigated Ms X’s complaint that the Council failed in its duty to make reasonable adjustments when communicating with her, but I have limited my investigation as explained below.
3. We cannot investigate complaints about events that took place more than 12 months before the complainant contacted the Ombudsman. We are only able to exercise discretion if there are good reasons to do so.
4. Ms X contacted the Ombudsman in December 2022, meaning events that took place before December 2021 have been brought to us late. I have seen no good reason to exercise discretion to look back further than this.
5. We cannot investigate matters that are not separable from court action that has already taken place, or which could reasonably be the subject of court action. For this reason, I have not investigated the Council’s actions around a court report or matters surrounding it. This includes Ms X’s complaint to the Council about that matter.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

6. 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’. 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)
7. We cannot investigate a complaint if someone has started court action about the matter. (Local Government Act 1974, section 26(6)(c), as amended)
8. The law says we cannot normally investigate a complaint when someone could take the matter to court. However, we may decide to investigate if we consider it would be unreasonable to expect the person to go to court. (Local Government Act 1974, section 26(6)(c), as amended)
9. The Courts have said that we cannot investigate a complaint about any action by a council, concerning a matter which is itself out of our jurisdiction. (R (on the application of M) v Commissioner for Local Administration [2006] EHWCC 2847 (Admin))
10. 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)
11. If we are satisfied with an organisation’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

12. I spoke to Ms X about her complaint and considered information she provided. I also considered information received from the Council.
13. Ms 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

Equality Act

14. The Equality Act 2010 says an individual or organisation that provides a service to the public, such as councils, must not treat someone worse just because of one or more “protected characteristics”. Protected characteristics include people with disabilities.
15. When the duty arises, the public body is under a positive and proactive duty to look at removing or preventing obstacles to a disabled person accessing its services. If the adjustments are reasonable, it must make them.
16. We cannot decide if an organisation has breached the Equality Act as this can only be done by the courts. But we can make decisions about whether an organisation has properly taken account of an individual’s rights in its treatment of them.

What happened

17. Ms X is dyslexic and struggles to process large volumes of written information.
18. The Council provides Ms X with support relating to her son.
19. The Council’s contact notes between December 2021 and December 2022 show it communicated with Ms X in a range of ways, usually by phone but sometimes face-to-face and sometimes by text message or email.
20. In February 2022, the notes show Ms X told a social worker she was struggling with documents due to her dyslexia. The social worker advised Ms X to seek support.
21. In May 2022, the notes show Ms X told the Council she was again struggling with documents, but a friend was helping her with these.
22. In September 2022, during a face-to-face visit, the notes show Ms X told a social worker her dyslexia meant she was struggling to read various documents. The social worker advised Ms X to write down any questions that came up so she could get help with her understanding. The social worker also offered to go through any plans Ms X needed explained, but she declined this offer.
23. Later that month, Ms X complained to the Council. Part of Ms X’s complaint was that the social worker would only communicate by email, despite Ms X being dyslexic.
24. The Council gave its view on Ms X’s complaint but did not refer to her comments about a refusal to communicate other than by email.
25. In November 2022, Ms X told the Council it had failed to respond to her complaint about the need to make adjustments to how it communicated with her and continued to send her written information without offering verbal explanations.
26. Ms X brought her complaint to the Ombudsman in December 2022.
27. In response to our enquiries the Council said:
• Its contact notes do not show Ms X ever told it she had a preferred contact method or asked it to make adjustments for her dyslexia.
• Ms X told it she was struggling with documents in February 2022 and September 2022, but these related to a private matter and its social workers offered advice and support.
• It could not identify any time when it had refused to communicate by phone or failed to make reasonable adjustments. Ms X frequently instigated contact by text message or email and it replied either by the same contact method, or with a phone call.
• Its notes show Ms X often specified she would prefer a text message or an email.

Analysis

28. Ms X says the Council refused to communicate with her other than through email, despite asking for adjustments due to her dyslexia. However, the information I have seen does not support this because there are many phone calls noted in the records. Based on the information I have seen, there was no insistence on email.
29. However, the Council’s notes show Ms X told it she was dyslexic and struggling with documents from February 2022. While the documents were not specifically related to the Council, the Council’s duty under the Equality Act 2010 is anticipatory. This means we would expect Council officers to ask Ms X if her dyslexia meant she had any needs around communication as soon as she made them aware of it.
30. The notes do not show the Council discussed reasonable adjustments with Ms X and failure to do so is fault.
31. From September 2022 the Council was aware Ms X wanted it to change the way it communicated with her because of her dyslexia. At that point, the Council had a duty under the Equality Act 2010 to consider making reasonable adjustments to the way it communicated with Ms X. I have seen no evidence to suggest it did so, which is fault. This has caused stress for Ms X and means her communication needs were not met causing her avoidable distress.
32. The Council also failed to consider Ms X’s communication needs when she chased it on this point in November 2022, which is further fault. This would have caused further distress for Ms X, which is injustice.

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Agreed action

33. To remedy the injustice identified above, I recommend the Council carry out the following actions:
34. Within one month:
• Provide Ms X with an apology for the distress caused
• Pay Ms X £150 to recognise the distress caused
35. Within three months:
• Remind staff of the importance of considering and responding to requests for reasonable adjustments to how it communicates
36. Next time the Council provides services to Mrs X it should review her communication needs to decide whether to make reasonable adjustments to how it communicates with her going forward and explain its decision.
37. The Council should provide us with evidence it has complied with the above actions.

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Final decision

38. I find the Council at fault for not considering whether it should adjust the way it communicates with Ms X. The Council accepted my recommendations and I have completed my investigation.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman