Summary: the Council failed to adequately inform Mr B about its investigation of his concerns. This caused him uncertainty as he could not be sure that these issues were thoroughly addressed under the correct procedure and had to complain to this office in order to establish this. The Council will apologise and make a payment of £200 to Mr B to recognise the injustice caused.

The complaint

1. The complainant, whom I shall refer to as Mr B, complains that the Council has failed to properly investigate his concerns and complaint that his daughter’s school transport escort behaved inappropriately towards him in front of his daughter when the escort dropped her home after school in May 2021. He also complains the Council’s consideration of his complaint discriminated against him because he was his daughter’s father and would have been treated differently if he was her mother.
2. The injustice Ms B claims is that the escort’s behaviour upset his daughter and placed her at risk and that its handling of his complaint was biased. Mr B wants the escort replaced with someone else.

Back to top

The Ombudsman’s role and powers

3. We investigate complaints of injustice caused by ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’. I have used the word ‘fault’ to refer to these. We cannot question whether a council’s decision is right or wrong simply because the complainant disagrees with it. We must consider whether there was fault in the way the decision was reached. (Local Government Act 1974, section 34(3), as amended)
4. 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 34H(i), as amended)

Back to top

How I considered this complaint

5. I discussed the complaint with Mr B and considered the written information he provided with his complaint. I made written enquiries of the Council and considered all the information before reaching a draft decision on it.
6. Under the information sharing agreement between the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman and the Office for Standards in Education, Children’s Services and Skills (Ofsted), we will share this decision with Ofsted.
7. Mr B and the Council had an opportunity to comment on my draft decision. I considered any comments received before making a final decision.

Back to top

What I found

What should have happened

8. The Council has an agreement with X’s mother regarding X’s home to school transport. This states that from September 2019 a specified taxi operator and a named escort will take X from her mother’s home address to her school every day.
9. The Council publishes guidelines for school transport escorts. This states:
• escorts should sit in the back of the taxi with the child when possible and that they should never leave the child on their own in the car or alone with the driver;
• escorts should never hand over a child to a different adult unless advised of this by the Council’s transport team;
• if a parent asks the escort to pick up or drop off a pupil anywhere other than the designated addresses, the escort must contact the Transport team before doing so as that mut be agreed. The designated parent must also contact the transport team if they want another person to meet their child from the taxi.
10. The Council wrote to X’s mother in September 2019 providing details of the home to school transport provided for X. It confirmed the name of the taxi firm providing transport, the name of the escort, the pick up point as being outside “the home address” (X’s mother ‘s address as detailed on the letter) and said the transport was to X’s named school and was daily provision.
11. The Children Act 1989 places a duty on local authorities to promote and safeguard the welfare of children in their area. Councils are required to have a process in place to investigate allegations against people who work with children if they have behaved in a way that has or may have harmed a child; committed a criminal offence against a child; or behaved in a way that indicates they may pose a risk to children. Hampshire County Council has such a process. This process states that it includes allegations against people including contractors and says that the person to who the allegation is made should keep a record of the allegation and should then report this to the designated person who should then pass it on to the LADO (Local Authority Designated Officer) and a decision is then reached on what should happen next.
12. The Council has a three stage complaints procedure whereby, if a complainant remains dissatisfied with the responses to their complaints at stage 1 or 2, they can ask for it to be move to the next stage of the procedure. After completing stage 3 of the procedure they may complain to the Ombudsman.

Background

13. Mr B’s daughter, X, is deaf and autistic. She lives most of the time with her mother. Mr B and X’s mother do not live together. The Council provides transport in the form of a taxi to take X to and from school. X has an escort with her in the taxi.
14. Mr B complained that in May 2021 the person who escorted his daughter to and from school in the taxi was unsuitable to undertake that task and should no longer do so. He also complained that his views about this had not been taken seriously and would have been taken more seriously had he been his child’s mother.
15. The background to what happened was that Mr B had contacted X’s taxi escort to ask him to drop her at his home rather than at her mother’s home. Mr B says this was because X’s mother was not at home so X could not return there.
16. He provided the Council with a video and audio clip of an interaction between him and the escort that took place on his doorstep when the escort returned his daughter to his address after school. The video and audio clip demonstrates:
• the escort went to Mr B’s door without X to speak to Mr B. X remained in the taxi;
• the escort told Mr B that he did not consider Mr B’s care of his daughter was very good and said he was returning her to Mr B’s address as a favour;
• the escort gestured to the taxi that X should come in after some conversation but continued the conversation with Mr B even though Mr B tried to end it and specifically asked the escort not to speak in that manner in front of X;
• X looked concerned by the interaction and hesitated outside the front door standing some distance from Mr B and the escort before being encouraged to enter the house.
17. It appears the discussion on the doorstep followed up a telephone conversation between Mr B and the Council earlier that day during which Mr B had been asking the escort to bring X to his house that day.
18. Mr B complained to the Council about what had happened.
19. In order to investigate the complaint the corporate complaints team contacted the transport team and asked for its comments on what had happened. The transport team seems to have accepted that there had never been any other concerns related to the escort but accepted that the interaction between the escort and Mr B was not what they would expect, that he had strayed into discussions outside his role and should only transport X between her home address and the school. The complaints team considered this could all be rectified under internal processes.
20. On 12 June the Council’s LADO emailed a senior officer in the children’s services team to say that having considered the details of the incident provided by Mr B “…it does not look like the LADO threshold has been met in respect of the behaviour of…the escort…”. He further explained this by stating that the taxi driver was DBS checked as this is a requirement for taxi drivers driving children. The LADO considered the content of the conversation on the doorstep was not a matter for the LADO but for the transport team.
21. The stage 2 investigation decision issued on 15 June went on to find:
• the escort was removed from his role with X whilst the concerns were investigated;
• the escort should not have taken X to Mr B’s address as that did not form part of the contract;
• the escort’s behaviour “fell below the standards of customer service we expect”. The Council said it had passed its concerns to the transport provider and asked that he was provided with suitable training. So, the Council upheld this part of the complaint;
• the Council was concerned that part of the conversation took place in X’s presence;
• no evidence of discrimination;
• following completion of the investigation the escort was reinstated to escort X but only to the address detailed in the contract: X’s mother’s address.
22. Later in June Mr B asked for further consideration of his complaint at stage 3 of the process. He told the Council he was dissatisfied with the investigation to that point as he had not been interviewed or contacted about it though the investigator at stage 2 did speak to X’s school and others involved in the transport provision. He also said he considered the Council’s response was discriminatory.
23. The Council provided its response at stage 3 in August 2021. That response stated:
• it was X’s mother who was detailed as her parent/guardian in the paperwork for her home to school transport and it was X’s mother’s address that was also provided in that paperwork. There were no details relating to Mr B. This meant that all transport arrangements were discussed with X’s mother. As the transport was agreed for between X’s mother’s address and school and back and it was X’s mother who was named as parental contact on school transport issues it was appropriate for X’s mother to have been included in issues about the them to school transport; and
• she considered the stage 2 investigation was not flawed though she did clarify and apologise for a couple of points that were somewhat unclear in that stage 2 response including stating that Mr B was not told that his concerns had been considered under safeguarding procedures until he complained at stage 3.

Was the Council at fault and did this cause injustice?

24. Mr B was unclear as to whether his concerns about the escort were considered under the appropriate safeguarding process. In its stage 3 response the Council said his concerns were considered under the safeguarding procedure but provided no further information on this. The Council failed to provide evidence of the safeguarding investigation when I first asked for this but in response to a further request provided the information from the LADO referred to in paragraph 20 above. The decision of the LADO was a matter for them and it is not for me to consider the merits of the LADO’s decision. So, whilst I am now satisfied that the LADO appropriately considered the matter I consider the lack of clarity for Mr B during the period of the investigation, or during its consideration of his complaint, as to whether or which safeguarding procedure the Council followed amounts to fault. This caused Mr B injustice in the form of uncertainty, frustration and avoidable time and trouble. This is because he could not be confident that the issues were fully and thoroughly considered under the appropriate procedure until I obtained this information as a result of his complaint to the Ombudsman.
25. Mr B is unhappy that no-one from the Council spoke to him or interviewed him about his concerns. As I have stated above I am now satisfied that the Council thoroughly investigated his concerns though it failed to make this sufficiently clear to him. As it did so I do not consider that any failure to contact him directly to discuss affected its consideration of the substantive concerns.
26. Mr B also complains the Council’s consideration of his complaint discriminated against him because he was his daughter’s father and would have been treated differently if he was her mother. I do not consider there is evidence to support this and accept that as the contract for the provision of transport was agreed between the Council and X’s mother it had to be mindful of this in its dealings with Mr B about the transport.

Back to top

Agreed action

27. The Council will, within one month of the date of the final decision on this complaint, apologise to Mr B and make a payment of £200. This is to recognise the avoidable frustration, uncertainty and time and trouble caused by the lack of clarity and information provided in relation to its consideration of the safeguarding issues and that he had to complain to this office in order for this lack of clarity to be resolved.

Back to top

Final decision

28. The Council failed to adequately inform Mr B about its investigation of his concerns. This caused him uncertainty as he could not be sure that these issues were thoroughly addressed under the correct procedure and had to complain to this office in order to establish this. The Council will take the action recommended above to remedy this.

Back to top

Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman