Summary: We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint about how the Council handled his complaint because there is not enough evidence of fault to justify an investigation.

The complaint

1. Mr X complains the Council wrongly used its own complaints procedure to respond to his complaint. He wants the Council to investigate his complaint using the statutory children’s complaints process.

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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 impact 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 or continue an investigation if we decide there is not enough evidence of fault to justify investigating. (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended, section 34(B))

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How I considered this complaint

3. I considered information provided by the complainant and the Council.
4. I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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My assessment

5. Mr X is the partner of Ms Y. Ms Y has a child, Z, who is in long term foster care with a full care order. Mr X asked for contact with Z and the Council said it would carry out police checks. Mr X complained to the Council and said its decision was having a significant impact on his health.
6. The Council responded to Mr X using its corporate complaints process. It said it asked for Mr X’s consent to do the checks as part of its risk assessment before allowing contact with Z. It explained this was a part of its safeguarding procedure.
7. Mr X said the Council should have responded to him using the statutory children’s complaints procedure. The Council said it used its own complaints process because Mr X was complaining about his own experience and it did not consider he had sufficient interest in Z’s welfare. It also said it could not share Z’s information with Mr X.
8. I will not investigate this complaint. The Ombudsman does not take a second look at a decision to decide if it was wrong. Instead, we look at the processes an organisation followed to make its decision. If we consider it followed those processes correctly, we cannot question whether the decision was right or wrong, regardless of whether Mr X agrees with the decision.
9. The Council has discretion to decide whether a person has sufficient interest in the child to raise a complaint. The Council decided Mr X did not. It wrote to Mr X to explain and responded to his complaint using its own complaints process.

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Final decision

10. We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint because there is not enough evidence of fault to justify an investigation by the Ombudsman.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman