The Investigation

The complaint

1. During two earlier investigations, we identified that faults in the way the Council was operating its children’s statutory complaints procedure were potentially causing injustice to others. We suspected systemic fault may be causing injustice. Therefore, using our extended investigation power, we opened this new complaint to investigate. We found that complainants have experienced delay, and in some cases, have been denied their right to access the full complaints procedure.

Legal and administrative background

The Ombudsman’s role and powers

2. We investigate complaints about ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’. In this report, we 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. We 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. We may investigate matters coming to our attention during an investigation, if we consider that a member of the public who has not complained may have suffered an injustice as a result. (Local Government Act 1974, sections 26D and 34E, as amended)

4. Under our information sharing agreement, we will share this report with the Office for Standards in Education, Children’s Services and Skills (Ofsted).

Law and guidance

5. 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. We also published practitioner guidance on the procedures, setting out our expectations.

6. The children’s statutory complaints procedure is a unique process designed to make sure councils hear and respond to the voices of vulnerable children and young people. It is designed to help councils improve the services provided to those individuals and others involved in their care.

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 investigating officer (IO) to look into the complaint and an independent person (IP) who is responsible for overseeing the investigation and ensuring its independence.

9. Guidance says once a complaint is completed at stage one, councils must proceed to stage two of the procedure if the complainant requests this.

10. Following the investigation, a senior manager (the adjudicating officer) at the council should carry out an adjudication. The officer considers the IO report and any report from the IP. They decide what the council’s response to the complaint will be, including what action it will take. The adjudicating officer should then write to the complainant with a copy of the investigation report, any report from the IP and the adjudication response.

11. The whole stage two procedure should be completed within 25 working days, but guidance allows an extension for up to 65 working days where required.

12. 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 working days of the date of request and then issue a final response within 20 working days of the panel hearing.

13. Our guidance, ‘Children’s Statutory Complaints Procedure’ provides advice and guidance to councils. It includes practical tips for councils to adopt to make sure the procedure runs smoothly. It also highlights key areas for learning, from our past investigations.

14. Councils can refuse to consider a complaint if a complainant says they intend to take legal action or if investigating a complaint could prejudice concurrent court proceedings. However, after the proceedings have ended, a complainant can resubmit the complaint for the council to consider.

15. There is no need for a complainant to complete a specific form to ask the council to move to stage two of the procedure. The council should not insist one is used or use failure to complete a specific form as a reason for ending the procedure.

How we considered this complaint

16. We have produced this report following the examination of relevant information provided by the Council.

17. We gave the Council a confidential draft of this report and invited its comments. We took those comments into account before finalising the report.

What we found

Analysis of data

18. In November 2024 we investigated two complaints about how the Council handled the children’s statutory complaints procedure.

19. We found fault in both complaints. In summary, complaints were not progressed to stage two of the procedure properly, communication with complainants was poor and there was significant delay. In both complaints, the Council’s handling of the administration required to keep the complaints to time, and monitoring of the procedure was flawed. Due to such strong similarities being identified, we made enquiries of the Council. This was to see if other complainants were affected by the same fault.

20. We asked the Council to provide 12 months of data (October 2023 – October 2024) about its handling of complaints which should have been considered through the children’s statutory complaints procedure. We invited the Council to make comments on the data and on its approach.

21. From October 2023 to October 2024 the Council recorded that it considered 125 complaints through the children’s statutory complaints procedure.

Monitoring and recording

22. When it responded to our enquiries in November 2024, the Council identified four complainants who experienced a delay in progressing their complaints to stage two of the procedure. The Council said it would apologise to the affected complainants.

23. When we looked at the data the Council shared with us, we found more complainants were affected.

24. The Council’s records indicate 29 complainants asked for their complaint to go to stage two of the children’s statutory complaints procedure.

25. The Council formally accepted 18 requests to move to stage two of the procedure, but it only started 15.

26. The Council gave three different reasons for this:

• “Stage 2 request was accepted but not actioned due to staff changes within the team”;

• the case was in court proceedings; and

• the complainant did not complete the stage two request form.

27. Out of the 15 complaints that moved to stage two we identified:

• 12 complaints were still open at stage two of the procedure;

• the status of two stage two investigations was unclear; and

• one complainant completed stage two and stage three of the procedure.

28. For the remaining 11 complainants where a stage two investigation did not take place, the reasons given by the Council were:

• court proceedings were ongoing for five complainants;

• two complaints ended at stage one;

• two complainants did not engage or asked for a pause in the procedure; and

• for two complainants, the Council said, “Stage 2 request was accepted but not actioned due to staff changes within the team”.

Delay

29. Eight out of the twelve complainants at stage two of the procedure experienced delay due to the Council failing to progress their complaints. Two of the complaints were originally made in 2023, and at the point of responding to our enquiries, in November 2024, the complaints at stage two were still ongoing. For all eight complainants, the original complaint was made at least 20 weeks (100 working days) prior to the point at which the Council responded to our enquiries. Stage one and two of the investigation procedure should take around 17 weeks (85 working days) in total to complete. This highlights the extent of the delay. While for some the delay would have been weeks, for others it was several months.

30. The Council accepted and progressed one complaint through all three stages of the procedure. Stage one to three of the procedure, at its longest, should take no longer than around 30 weeks to complete. This complaint took one year to resolve.

31. The Council told us it has a plan in place to address the delays in dealing with complaints via its children’s statutory complaints procedure. Therefore, we have not made service improvement recommendations about delay.

Staffing

32. The Council said the complaints team had experienced staff changes over the last 12 months. It said it had a plan to address the issues including employing a permanent team of staff and providing training.

Conclusions

33. At least eight complainants experienced delay at stage two of the procedure. For three complainants the Council accepted their stage two request, but it did not begin the stage two investigation. For at least two complainants, the status of the procedure was unclear. For one complainant, the investigation (stages one to three) took a year to complete. All of that is fault. This fault will have caused undue frustration and distress for those complainants.

34. The Council’s failure to progress a complaint to stage two of the procedure because a complainant did not complete a form is fault. If the request is clear and there is sufficient information for the Council to understand what the complaint is, it should be progressed to stage two.

Recommendations

35. The Council must consider the report and confirm within three months the action it has taken or proposes to take. The Council should consider the report at its full Council, Cabinet or other appropriately delegated committee of elected members and we will require evidence of this. (Local Government Act 1974, section 31(2), as amended)

36. Within three months of the date of this report we recommend the Council:

• writes to complainants who did not proceed to stage two of the procedure, due to fault of the Council, and invite them to do so. When writing also make an apology to recognise the delay and/or poor complaint handling. We publish guidance on remedies which sets out our expectations for how organisations should apologise effectively to remedy injustice. The organisation should consider this guidance in making the apology we have recommended in our findings;

• if it has not already done so, complete stage two of the procedure for the 12 complainants whose stage two investigations were ongoing, prioritising those suffering the most delay;

• ensures staff involved in the children’s statutory complaints procedure understand what is required to progress a complaint to stage two. A complainant does not need to complete a specific form, as long as there is enough information to understand what the complaint is; and

• updates the relevant scrutiny committee on the progress made towards ending the delays for complainants, using an action plan, that is regularly reviewed. This is to ensure improvement is monitored by senior officials.

37. The Council has agreed to carry out our recommendations.

Decision

38. We have completed our investigation. There was fault by the Council which caused injustice to at least 12 complainants. The Council will take the action identified in paragraph 36 to remedy that injustice.

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