Summary: We will not investigate this complaint that the Council’s social worker acted with bias against the complainant, produced an inaccurate assessment and supported his child’s mother in denying him his parental rights. Investigation would achieve nothing significant and our intervention is not therefore warranted.

The complaint

1. The complainant, Mr X, complains that the Council’s social worker acted with bias against him, produced an inaccurate assessment and supported his child’s mother in denying him his parental rights. He further complains that it failed to properly consider his subsequent complaint.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

2. We investigate complaints about ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’, which we call ‘fault’. We must also consider whether any fault has had an adverse effect on the person making the complaint, which we call ‘injustice’. We provide a free service, but must use public money carefully. We do not start an investigation if we decide the tests set out in our Assessment Code are not met. (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended)

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How I considered this complaint

3. I considered information provided by the complainant.
4. I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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My assessment

5. Mr X’s child was the subject of a Child and Family Assessment carried out by the Council’s social worker. Mr X says the social worker’s intervention worsened the situation between him and his child’s mother, rather than deescalating it. He says the social worker came to the meeting with him having decided to support his child’s mother in refusing to return the child to his care, thereby disregarding his parental rights.
6. Mr X says that the Council failed to share the assessment report with him before it was finalised. As a result, the report was inaccurate. He says his child’s mother subsequently initiated private legal proceedings seeking full care of the child and used the inaccurate report in the course of the proceedings.
7. Mr X made a formal complaint to the Council, which completed the three stages of the statutory procedure for complaints about children’s services. Mr X says the procedure was flawed, in that the Council unreasonably excluded elements of his complaint and failed to consider material evidence. He says the payment of £350 the Council has offered in response to the failure to allow him appropriate input into the child and family assessment does not reflect the significance of the fault and resulting injustice. He believes action should be taken against the officers involved and the inaccurate assessment report amended.
8. The Ombudsman will not investigate Mr X’s complaint because we could not attribute the injustice he says he has been caused to the fault he has identified, and could not achieve the outcomes he is seeking. There is therefore nothing significant to be gained from investigation.
9. Whether or not the social worker supported the child’s mother in denying Mr X his parental rights is not relevant. The decision to do so was for the mother to make, not the Council. Mr X’s recourse would have been to pursue the matter in court. Any disadvantage the content of the assessment report caused Mr X in private law proceedings falls outside the Ombudsman’s jurisdiction to consider, as the law prevents us from considering what happens in court.
10. Investigation by the Ombudsman would not lead to the outcomes Mr X is seeking. We will not ask a council to change an assessment retrospectively. The most we would seek is that a complainant’s dissenting view is included in the records. Mr X has set out his views in the course of the statutory complaint procedure, the documents of which now form part of the record, so this has already been achieved. If Mr X believes the Council’s records contain inaccurate information about him, his recourse is to pursue his right to rectification. There is no role for the Ombudsman.
11. The Ombudsman considers complaints against councils as corporate bodies, not against individuals. We have no power to recommend that the Council takes action against specific officers. We cannot investigate whether social workers are meeting their professional standards of conduct. Complaints of this nature should be referred to the social workers’ professional body, Social Work England.
12. Where a substantive complaint does not fall to be investigated, we will not normally consider how a council has considered a complaint about it. It is not a good use of our resources to do so. We will not therefore investigate whether the Council has been at fault in its response to Mr X’s complaint.

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Final decision

13. We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint because our intervention would achieve nothing significant.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman