Stockton Council to pay ‘Mr X’ £100 after failings in complaint

The Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman found the council gave a “misleading” suggestion to the complainant, referred to as Mr X, and caused him “avoidable frustration at an already stressful time”.

The council agreed to apologise for this and pay him £100 to recognise it, and has said it can now learn from the ombudsman’s findings.

Mr X made a complaint to the council about its actions after he asked for support regarding his adopted child.

He said the council failed to properly consider this complaint, causing him and his family distress, frustration and uncertainty.

Councils are meant to follow a three-stage procedure when looking into complaints about children’s social care.

At the first stage, Mr X said he “felt unsupported by the council in managing his adopted children’s needs” and he had not been provided with enough information about the child’s needs before the adoption.

The council said it could not comment on pre-adoption documents because this related to a different council. It said a foster carer had offered regular respite.

Mr X asked the council to move the complaint on the second stage. Here he said the family had not received sufficient respite, there were delays in providing support for the children, which meant they had to ask the council to accommodate the child under the Children’s Act, and council assessments and child protection conferences were not carried out properly.

The council’s investigating officer upheld less than half of Mr X’s complaints. Mr X did not agree with the council’s findings and said several of its responses contained inaccurate information.

Mr X asked the council to consider the complaint at the third stage of its procedure. However, the council said it met the criteria to refer it to the ombudsman early as “there was a robust report, significant complaints were upheld and there was an action plan”.

However, the ombudsman did not agree, saying: “We expect people to complete the complaints procedure before we will consider whether there were any flaws in how the council investigated their concerns.

“The council has not yet considered Mr X’s complaint at stage three, so I have not investigated his concerns about the lack of adoption support provided by the council.

“The council’s suggestion for Mr X to approach the ombudsman rather than it investigate his complaint at stage three, when asked, was misleading and was fault. This caused Mr X avoidable frustration at an already stressful time.

“The case did not meet the criteria for an early referral because the stage two investigation did not uphold all the significant complaints.”

It said the council agreed to hold a panel at stage three of the complaints procedure to consider Mr X’s complaint and any delays.

It said this should resolve Mr X’s concerns about inaccuracies in the council’s response and questions over the robustness of its investigation.

It found fault – defined as “maladministration” and “service failure” – with the council, concluding: “I find fault causing injustice. The council has agreed actions to remedy injustice.”

Councillor Clare Besford, Stockton Council’s cabinet member for children and young people, said: “We recognise the findings of the ombudsman and have offered our apologies to the complainant. We have also made a payment of £100 to Mr X.

“Moving forward, we can learn from the ombudsman’s findings and bring them into consideration for any future requests for a stage three review panel.”