Summary: We will not investigate Ms X’s complaint about children services’ actions. We have upheld Ms X’s complaint as the Council has now agreed to follow the Children Act statutory complaints’ procedure which is a proportionate way to resolve the complaint.

The complaint

1. Ms X complains about four issues:
• The home to school transport service dropping her child Y off on the ground floor and not at her door.
• The home to school transport persisting in having a boy in the transport whom Ms X says bullies Y.
• Y being bullied in their educational setting
• The lack of respite care at weekends.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

2. We cannot investigate most complaints about what happens in schools. (Local Government Act 1974, Schedule 5, paragraph 5(2), as amended)
3. The law says we cannot normally investigate a complaint unless we are satisfied the organisation knows about the complaint and has had an opportunity to investigate and reply. However, we may decide to investigate if we consider it would be unreasonable to notify the organisation of the complaint and give it an opportunity to investigate and reply. (Local Government Act 1974, section 26(5), section 34(B)6)
4. We investigate complaints about ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’. In this statement, I have used the word fault to refer to these. We provide a free service but must use public money carefully. We may decide not to start or continue with an investigation if we are satisfied with the actions a council has taken or proposes to take. (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(7), as amended)
5. Under our information sharing agreement, we will share this decision with the Office for Standards in Education, Children’s Services and Skills (Ofsted).

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How I considered this complaint

6. I considered information provided by Ms X and the Council.
7. I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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My assessment

Background procedure

8. 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.
9. The first stage of the procedure is local resolution. Councils have up to 20 working days to respond.
10. 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.
11. If a complainant is unhappy with the result 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.

This case’s events

12. The Council has provided its replies to Ms X’s fourth complaint only from January 2025 and April 2025. Both replies were made within the Council’s corporate complaints’ procedure. The Council says it has not had the opportunity to reply to the first two complaints. It says the third complaint is for the school to reply to.
13. We cannot investigate Ms X’s complaint that Y has been bullied at school as we cannot investigate what happens inside education settings.
14. We will not investigate Ms X’s complaints about the school transport service as the Council needs a reasonable opportunity to reply to those complaints directly.
15. If we were to investigate the fourth complaint it is likely we would find fault causing the complainant injustice because this complaint falls within the Children Act statutory complaints’ procedure and the Council has used its corporate procedure.

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Agreed action

16. The Council has agreed to:
• Complete a Children Act statutory complaints’ procedure stage two within 65 working days of the date of this final decision.

• Notify Ms X of her rights under the procedure at the end of stage two.

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Final decision

17. We have upheld this complaint because we asked the Council to remedy the injustice caused by not using the right complaints’ procedure and it has agreed a proportionate remedy for Ms X.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman