Summary: We will not investigate this complaint about the Council’s provision of free school meals for children educated otherwise than at school. There is insufficient evidence of fault on the Council’s part to warrant investigation.

The complaint

1. The complainant, Ms X, complains that the Council is at fault in implementing a voucher system for the provision of free school meals for children educated otherwise than at school and in requiring the production of receipts to evidence her spending on food.

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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. Ms X’s children are educated otherwise than at school and are entitled to free school meals. The Council discharges its duty to provide fee school meals through a voucher scheme.
6. Ms X complains that the Council’s scheme requires her to produce receipts to evidence her spending on food. She regards this as unreasonable and amounting to over-monitoring, and has indicated that she will not comply. She regards the stipulation that vouchers must not be spent on cigarettes or alcohol as insulting. She further complains that she was wrongly advised that the vouchers could be used for online shopping at a specific retailer from which she sources food which meet her children’s dietary needs.
7. Ms X says she wants the Council to remove the requirement that she provide receipts and apologise to her. Alternatively, she wants it to make a reasonable adjustment under which it delivers food to her directly.
8. In response, the Council has declined to change its requirement for receipts to be produced or to make changes to the operation of the voucher system. It has apologised for wrongly stating that the specific retailer takes the vouchers.
9. The Ombudsman will not investigate Ms X’s complaint. It is not for us to criticise the way in which the Council chooses to discharge its responsibility to provide free school meals unless there is evidence of significant fault on its part. There is no such evidence.
10. The Council is entitled to determine the terms of use for its vouchers and it is not unreasonable to require receipts. We will not criticise it for doing so. Ms X disagrees with the system the Council has chosen to use to discharge its responsibility to provide free school meals. But it is entitled to decide how it does so. There is insufficient evidence of significant fault on its part to warrant investigation, and we will not intervene.

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Final decision

11. We will not investigate Ms X’s complaint because there is insufficient evidence of fault on the Council’s part.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman