The Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman has made four recommendations to Government on how the organisation could improve the public services it oversees in its flagship Triennial Review, launched today.

The Review assesses the effectiveness of the Ombudsman’s service alongside the delivery of services in the local government and social care systems and suggests ways these could be improved.

The number of cases coming to the English Ombudsman service has been increasing steadily for the last three years, dominated by complex issues in the areas of Special Educational Needs and Disabilities, adult social care and homelessness. These cases usually centre around the person involved having been seriously affected by the failure of services.

Because of this, the LGSCO has made four recommendations to ensure its powers are fit for purpose, and improve the way the organisations it investigates handle complaints. 

To improve services for children and young people with Special Educational Needs and Disabilities, the Ombudsman has called for the power to investigate the way Education, Health and Care Plans are implemented in schools. It also wants to be able to investigate cases where children and young people with additional needs are admitted or excluded from schools, and issues with the support they are offered in the school setting.

To improve the way complaints are handled by independent adult social care providers, the Ombudsman has called for mandatory signposting to the LGSCO at the end of the complaints process as evidence from investigations suggests that not all providers do so, which denies people the ability to have independent redress.

Ms Amerdeep Somal said:

“As the last port of call for complaints about local government and social care services, we play a vital role in the oversight of these services and in improving services for everyone in England.

“But the landscape we operate in is changing at an ever-increasing pace, and we need our powers to reflect this so we can provide a better service to those who come to us for redress when things go wrong.

“The recommendations we have made should close some of the accountability gaps we know exist for people, and ensure we operate as a modern Ombudsman service in the years to come.”

The Ombudsman also wants its jurisdiction to be updated to ensure it is able to provide redress for all local government services, including those arrangements emerging through the devolution agenda, which aims to allow more decisions to be taken by local communities.

Finally, the Ombudsman has asked for it to be made a statutory duty to monitor compliance with its new Complaint Handling Code, due to be implemented by councils from April 2026, which is designed to make complaints handling more consistent across all local authorities.

Article date: 21 November 2024