Mrs A complains about the care the Council and the Trust provided to her late mother and father. Most of the events date between 2023 and 2024. We will not investigate these complaints because they are late and it is unlikely we could achieve anything more.

The complaint

1. Mrs A raises complaints against Plymouth City Council (the Council) and University Hospitals Plymouth NHS Trust (the Trust). Livewell Southwest provide the adult social care function on behalf of the Council.
2. The complaints relate to the care of her parents, Mr and Mrs B, on multiple wards at hospitals run by the Trust as well as at multiple care homes between 2021 and their deaths in 2023 and 2024 respectively.
3. Mrs A says her parents experienced a low quality of care throughout their involvement with the Trust and the Council. She was upset and distressed at constantly having to speak to the Trust and the Council about their care.

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The Ombudsmen’s role and powers

4. The Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman and Health Service Ombudsman have the power to jointly consider complaints about health and social care. (Local Government Act 1974, section 33ZA, as amended, and Health Service Commissioners Act 1993, section 18ZA).
5. Part 3 of the Local Government Act 1974 give us our powers to investigate adult social care complaints. Part 3 is for complaints where local councils provide services themselves. It also applies where a council arranges or commissions care services from a provider, even if the council charges the person receiving the care. In these cases, we treat the provider’s actions as if they were council actions. (Part 3 Local Government Act 1974; section 25(6) & (7) of the Act)
6. We cannot investigate late complaints unless we decide there are good reasons. Late complaints are when someone takes more than 12 months to complain to us about something a council/care provider has done. (Local Government Act 1974, sections 26B and 34D, as amended)
7. We provide a free service, but must use public money carefully. We may decide not to start or continue with an investigation if we believe it is unlikely we could add to any previous investigation by the bodies. (Health Service Commissioners Act 1993, section 3(2) and Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended)

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How I considered this complaint

8. I considered evidence provided by Mrs A as well as relevant law, policy and guidance.

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What I found

Complaints about the Trust

9. Mrs A complains about the care provided to her mother and father in various wards in hospitals run by the Trust.
10. Mr B died in 2023, and Mrs B died in 2024.
11. Mrs A received a final response to her complaints in November 2024, but she did not bring her concerns to the Ombudsman until January 2026.
12. The law says we cannot consider complaints which are more than 12 months old if there is not good reason for us to do so.
13. I asked Mrs A why she did not contact the Ombudsman sooner and she said she had had a virus, and her husband had surgery. Mrs A also said she spoke to someone at the Ombudsmen who took her details, but I have checked both Ombudsmen systems and we have no record of any contact from Mrs A before she submitted an online complaint form.
14. While I appreciate ill health may add delays to contacting the Ombudsman, the delay is 15 months after the final response from the Trust. The more time passes between the events and a complaint, the more unlikely it is we can investigate them effectively, gather reliable evidence and reach a sound decision. In older cases we also may not be able to achieve a meaningful remedy because too many circumstances have changed. We are often unable to be able to show why events occurred or understand who was responsible.
15. The Trust has investigated Mrs A’s complaints and provided full responses. The coroner has also been involved. There are no good reasons for us to investigate the complaints now.

Complaints about the Council

16. Mrs A also complained to the Council about her parents care in various care placements. One of these complaints was about tissue viability care provided to her mother, as well as safeguarding, in March 2023 by Livewell Southwest.
17. To try and help Mrs A gain closure, Livewell Southwest agreed to investigate the complaint and provided a final response in February 2026.
18. Due to the passage of time since the events, Livewell Southwest could only rely on the contemporaneous records from the time. It has provided detailed explanations and been honest where there is no evidence and said it could not reach conclusions. It has also told Mrs A where process or procedure, especially in relation to safeguarding, has since changed to reassure her.
19. Livewell Southwest were not obligated to investigate Mrs A’s concerns as they were received outside of the complaints timeframe of 12 months. However, it agreed to try and help Mrs A understand what happened and reassure her it was committed to improving the care it provides. This is what we expect to see.
20. Given the amount of time that was now elapsed since the events, it is unlikely the Ombudsmen would reach different conclusions as we could only look at the same information as Livewell Southwest.

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Decision

21. We will not investigate this complaint. The complaint about the Trust is late and it is unlikely an Ombudsmen investigation could add anything further to the conclusions made by Livewell Southwest on behalf of the Council.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman