Summary: The Council was not at fault for its handling of Mr X’s complaint about its children’s social care service. Statutory guidance supports its decision not to consider a new complaint brought by Mr X part-way through the complaint procedure.

The complaint

1. Mr X complains that, in dealing with his complaint about its children’s social care service, the Council relied on inaccurate case records and did not allow him to challenge them.

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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. If we are satisfied with a council’s actions or proposed actions, we can complete our investigation and issue a decision statement. (Local Government Act 1974, section 30(1B) and s34H(1), as amended)

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How I considered this complaint

3. I considered evidence provided by Mr X and the Council as well as relevant guidance.
4. Mr X and the Council had an opportunity to comment on my draft decision. I considered any comments before making a final decision.

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What I found

5. The statutory guidance, ‘Getting the best from complaints’, sets out a three-stage procedure for complaints about certain aspects of children’s social care. I refer to this as ‘the statutory procedure’.
6. Foster carers of looked-after children (such as Mr X) can use this procedure to complain about the support the children in their care receive.
7. If a complaint has already been through the statutory procedure, this means the complainant has already had access to an independent investigation.
8. We are not an appeal stage and do not simply add another independent investigation to the previous one as a matter of course. We will not normally re-investigate such a complaint unless we have reason to believe the previous investigation was flawed in a way which disadvantaged the complainant.
9. I have considered the documents from Mr X’s complaint, and I note that:
• All parts of the original complaint (as agreed at the outset of the stage 2 investigation) were considered and addressed by the Council.
• The independent investigator had access to the Council’s records and referred to her consideration of those records where necessary.
• The investigator also interviewed the relevant staff members who still worked for the Council (in line with best practice recommended in the statutory guidance) and clearly referred to those interviews in her consideration of the individual points of complaint.
• An independent panel reviewed the investigator’s findings. Mr X had the opportunity to put his views to the panel before it made its decision – both before the hearing (in writing) and during it (in person).
• The Council completed the remedial actions it agreed at stages 2 and 3.
10. However, Mr X claims that the case records the independent investigator relied on were wrong. He says he brought this to the attention of the independent panel, but he was ignored. He complains that the panel Chair said the panel was “not in a position to re-open stage 2”, and its remit was purely to review whether investigative procedure had been followed correctly.
11. The statutory guidance supports the Chair’s position. The role of the panel is to consider the adequacy of the stage 2 investigation. Its role is not to reinvestigate complaints. And it should not generally consider new complaints which have not already been made at stage 2 (which applied to Mr X’s new complaint about the case records).
12. This means there was no fault in the Council’s consideration of Mr X’s complaint.
13. If Mr X believes that the Council’s case records are inaccurate, he can pursue this with the Council directly. This can be either:
• as a new complaint, using his right as a foster carer to complain about certain aspects of children’s social care (if the case records are about the child); or
• via the Council’s data protection procedures, citing his right to rectification of inaccurate personal data under section 46 of the Data Protection Act 2018 (if the case records are about Mr X).
14. If the outcome of any future complaint about this matter is that the Council’s case records are inaccurate, as Mr X alleges, he can then ask the Council to rectify or delete any inaccurate documents associated with this current complaint.
15. If, following this, Mr X remains dissatisfied, he can complain to the Information Commissioner’s Office.

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Decision

16. The Council was not at fault.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman