Complaints about Standards and Member Conduct This fact sheet is aimed primarily at anyone who is unhappy with the conduct of a council member (councillor) and is considering making a complaint to the Ombudsman. How is the conduct of local councillors regulated? The Localism Act 2011 governs the system of standards of member conduct in England. This system applies to county, district and unitary ...

Liverpool criticised by Ombudsman for failing disabled teenage siblings The Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman has criticised Liverpool City Council for not ensuring two teenage siblings with significant needs were provided with the support they should have received for 18 months. The siblings, who have multiple disabilities including visual impairments and complex communication needs, bo ...

Council’s decision-making criticised during school transport investigation The Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman has asked Staffordshire County Council to reconsider whether it pays for transport to get a teenager, who has autism, to her college some 25 miles away. Since moving to post-16 education, the girl has not received any financial help to get to the college named in her Education ...

Councillors and MPs This page helps Councillors and MPs understand what to do, if they want to help somebody use our service or make a complaint themselves. What complaints can the Ombudsman investigate? We can investigate complaints about most council services. This includes services that councils pay other organisations to deliver (usually called outsourced or commissioned services). We can inv ...

Manual for Councils Contents: Chapter index for Manual for Councils Updated: 09 September 2025 Manual for Councils search Search this content Submit search Part 10 • Duty to report our decisions to elected officials Duty to report our decisions to elected officials If we make a finding of fault, councils and some authorities have a duty to report that finding to elected officials. However, the re ...

Lancashire County Council criticised for failing to support vulnerable children properly Lancashire County Council has been criticised by the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman for not providing the right support for two vulnerable siblings when they moved to live with their aunt and uncle. The siblings, who had a turbulent background and had spent time in foster care, became subject to a ...

Ombudsman investigation highlights councils’ recruitment problems The problems faced by councils in recruiting educational psychologists have been highlighted in an investigation report by the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman. The report, which upholds a North Yorkshire mother’s complaint about delays by the county council in meeting her son’s Education, Health and Care (EHC) Plan, has ...

Ombudsman investigation highlights housing delays in Birmingham The high number of families trying to join councils’ housing lists is being highlighted by the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman following one family’s complaint about their situation. The family told the Ombudsman that Birmingham City Council took too long to assess their circumstances. During the Ombudsman’s investigation ...

Ombudsman investigation reveals 170 delayed complaints in Kent A Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman investigation has uncovered a backlog of 170 unanswered children’s services and education complaints in Kent. The Ombudsman was asked to investigate after Kent County Council failed to respond to a mother’s complaint that her son had not been provided with the Speech and Language Therapy (S ...

North Tyneside child left without alternative education for more than a year because of council failures - Ombudsman North Tyneside Council has agreed to pay £5,900 to a family after the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman found it failed to provide promised specialist technology that would have allowed a child with special educational needs to learn from home - the second time the Ombudsm ...