Thurrock Council
Complaint overview
Between 1 April 2024 to 31 March 2025, we dealt with 84 complaints. Of these, 27 were not for us or not ready for us to investigate. We assessed and closed 40 complaints. We investigated 17 complaints.
More about this data
Complaints dealt with – the total number of complaints and enquiries considered. It is not appropriate to investigate all of them.
Not for us – includes complaints brought to us before the council was given chance to consider it, or the complainant came to the wrong Ombudsman.
Assessed and closed – includes complaints where the law says we’re not allowed to investigate, or it would be a poor use of public funds if we did.
Investigated – we completed an investigation and made a decision on whether we found fault, or no fault.
Complaints upheld – we completed an investigation and found evidence of fault, or the organisation provided a suitable remedy early on.
Satisfactory remedies provided by the Council – the council upheld the complaint and we agreed with how it offered to put things right.
Compliance with Ombudsman recommendations – not complying with our recommendations is rare. A council with a compliance rate below 100% should scrutinise the complaints where it failed to comply and identify any learning.
Average performance rates – we compare the annual statistics of similar types of councils to work out an average level of performance. We do this for County Councils, District Councils, Metropolitan Boroughs, Unitary Councils, and London Boroughs.
For more information on understanding our statistics see Interpreting our complaints data.
Complaints dealt with
Not for us
Assessed and closed
Investigated
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Complaints upheld
We investigated 17 complaints and upheld 11.
65% of complaints we investigated were upheld.
This compares to an average of 80% in similar authorities.
View upheld decisionsAdjusted for Thurrock Council's population, this is 6.2 upheld decisions per 100,000 residents.
The average for authorities of this type is
5.3 upheld decisions per 100,000 residents. -
Satisfactory remedies provided by the Council
In 1 out of 11 upheld cases we found the Council had provided a satisfactory remedy before the complaint reached the Ombudsman.
9% satisfactory remedy rate.
This compares to an average of 10% in similar authorities.
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Compliance with Ombudsman recommendations
We recorded compliance outcomes in 8 cases.
In 8 cases we were satisfied with the actions taken.100% compliance rate with recommendations.
This compares to an average of 100% in similar authorities.
Annual letters
We write to councils each year to give a summary of the complaint statistics we record about them,
and their performance in responding to our investigations.
Reports
The Ombudsman has published the following reports against Thurrock Council
Find out more about reports
We issue reports on certain investigations, particularly where there is a wider public interest to do so. Common reasons for reports are significant injustice, systemic issues, major learning points and non-compliance with our recommendations. Issuing reports is one way we help to ensure councils are accountable to local people and highlighting the learning from complaints helps to improve services for everybody. Reports are published for 10 years.
Woman left trapped in home because of poor council assisted bin collection service
Thurrock bin crews have repeatedly trapped a wheelchair user in her home when they have not returned her bins to their proper place, the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman (LGSCO) has found.
Service improvements
The Council has agreed to make the following improvements to its services following an Ombudsman investigation.
Find out more about service improvements
When we find fault, we can recommend improvements to systems and processes where they haven’t worked properly, so that others do not suffer from these same problems in future. Common examples are policy changes; procedural reviews; and staff training. Service improvements from decisions are published for 5 years and those from reports are published for 10 years.
The latest 10 cases are listed below – click ‘view all’ to find all service improvements.
Case reference: 24 015 180
Category: Education
Sub Category: Special educational needs
- Within three months of the decision, the Council will:Review the delays it has encountered in securing a speech and language therapist in this matter and create a plan to avoid a recurrence of this.Create a long-term plan to deal with the issues it has faced in securing an occupational therapist going forward.
Case reference: 24 006 343
Category: Education
Sub Category: Special educational needs
- The Council will review its decision-making process by SEN panels to ensure:a) when making decisions SEN panels give enough details to allow case officers making specific arrangements for children and young people with SEN;b) there is a system in place for checking how outcomes of the SEN panels have been implemented.
- The Council will ensure new SEN case officers receive briefing when taking over children’s cases.
Case reference: 24 010 958
Category: Housing
Sub Category: Homelessness
- Within three months of the decision, the Council will: • Through managerial oversight or other appropriate means, ensure the Council promptly accepts the prevention duty and issues a personalised housing plan when satisfied an applicant is threatened with homelessness. • Provide training or guidance to relevant staff on deciding when a private tenant served a notice is homeless and how to record this to demonstrate regard for Chapter 6of the Code of Guidance in every case.• Remind relevant staff that no one owed the interim accommodation duty should be evicted by bailiffs because the Council has not provided accommodation.2. The Council should provide us with evidence it has complied with the above actions.
Case reference: 23 016 883
Category: Environment and regulation
Sub Category: Refuse and recycling
- The Council agreed to send a further reminder to the relevant crew about arrangements for collecting recycling bins on this side of the road.
Case reference: 23 016 355
Category: Housing
Sub Category: Allocations
- The Council has agreed to provide a copy of this decision statement to officers that process housing applications to make them aware of the need to avoid taking an overly restrictive approach when assessing evidence provided by applicants.
Case reference: 23 014 983
Category: Housing
Sub Category: Allocations
- The Council has also agreed that it will issue a reminder to relevant staff of the duty to carry out an assessment if there is reason to believe a person may be homeless or threatened with homelessness within the next 56 days.
Case reference: 23 013 462
Category: Education
Sub Category: School admissions
- The Council will update its Fair Access Protocol to include a process and timescale for referrals to the Secretary of State for the direction of admission to academy schools.
- The Council will arrange internal training with its officers in the Admissions/Fair Access Protocol/Children Missing in Education teams to go over the service improvements. The Council will also use the training to refresh officers’ knowledge around the Fair Access Protocol and the requirement to escalate applications without delay if a pupil is off-roll and not receiving any education.
Case reference: 22 016 333
Category: Education
Sub Category: Special educational needs
- By training or other means remind relevant staff of the requirement to carry out an Education, Health and Care assessment within four weeks of notifying the Tribunal it has conceded and agreed to assess a child or young person.
- Remind relevant staff of the requirement to issue a final Education, Health and Care Plan within 20 weeks from the date an assessment was requested.
- Provide guidance to relevant staff about the importance of making reasonable adjustments such as arranging advocates for service users to access its services. This is to ensure the Council complies with its legal obligations under the Equality Act 2010.
- By training or other means remind relevant staff of the importance of completing carer’s assessments to ensure support needs for carers are identified and met in a timely manner.
Case reference: 23 004 040
Category: Education
Sub Category: School transport
- The Council will review its transport policy and ensure it is in line with the position set out in S and another v Dudley Metropolitan Borough Council [2012] EWCA Civ 3
Case reference: 23 002 787
Category: Housing
Sub Category: Allocations
- Issue a briefing note to staff who deal with housing applications and reviews, reminding them of the need to consider the full extent of the Council's discretion under paragraphs 1.2.2.2 and 1.2.2.4.
Last updated: 4 April 2015