Summary: We have upheld this complaint because the Council delayed considering a complaint at stage three of the children’s statutory complaints procedure. The Council has now agreed to resolve the complaint by apologising to the complainant and offering to make a payment to them to remedy the time and trouble they have been too. It will also arrange a stage three panel to take place within one month.

The complaint

1. The complainant, who I will call Mrs X, complains about how the Council managed the child in need process for her children. Mrs X asked the Ombudsman to intervene when the Council failed to escalate her complaint to stage three of the complaints process.

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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 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. Under our information sharing agreement, we will share the final decision with the Office for Standards in Education, Children's Services and Skills (Ofsted).

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How I considered this complaint

4. I considered information provided by the complainant and the Council.
5. I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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My assessment

The statutory complaints procedure

6. The law sets out a three-stage procedure for councils to follow when looking at complaints about children’s social care services. The accompanying statutory guidance, Getting the Best from Complaints, explains councils’ responsibilities in more detail.
7. The first stage of the procedure is local resolution. Councils have up to 20 working days to respond.
8. If a complainant is not happy with a council’s stage one response, they can ask that it is considered at stage two. At this stage of the procedure, councils appoint an investigator and an independent person who is responsible for overseeing the investigation. Councils have up to 13 weeks to complete stage two of the process from the date of request.
9. If a complainant is unhappy with the outcome of the stage two investigation, they can ask for a stage three review by an independent panel. The Council must hold the panel within 30 days of the date of request, and then issue a final response within 20 days of the panel hearing.
10. The statutory guidance says that If a complaint has entered stage one the local authority is obliged to ensure the complaint proceeds to stages two and three if the complaint requests this.

What happened

11. The Council considered Mrs X’s complaint at stage two of the statutory children’s complaints procedure. Dissatisfied with the Council’s response, Mrs X asked the Council to escalate her complaint to the final stage.
12. The Council said it would not escalate Mrs X’s complaint because the outcome she was seeking was for records to be amended and this would be better dealt with under a data protection request. Mrs X provided the Council with further reasons why she was dissatisfied with the stage two response but did not receive a response.

Assessment

13. If we were to investigate this complaint it is likely we would find the Council at fault. This is because once a complaint has been considered under the statutory procedure councils must ensure that the complaint progresses through all three stages if the complainant wishes. It therefore should have progressed her complaint to stage three when she asked and its failure to do so has caused a delay in the process. This has meant Mrs X has been to time and trouble pursuing her complaint and has resulted in a delay in her receiving answers to the questions raised in her complaint.
14. We therefore asked the Council to arrange a stage three panel within one month and issue its final response to Mrs X without further delay. We also asked the Council to make a payment to Mrs X of £100 to remedy the time and trouble she has been too pursuing her complaint.
15. To its credit, the Council agreed to resolve the complaint by agreeing with our recommendation. Therefore, within one month of the date of this final decision, it will arrange a stage three panel and offer to make a payment to Mrs X of £100.

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Final decision

16. We have upheld this complaint. The Council has agreed to resolve the complaint early by providing an appropriate remedy.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman