Summary: Miss X complained the Council failed to carry out the recommendations it identified during its response to her complaint about the way the Council handled the adoption of her child. There was fault in how the Council considered and implemented the recommendation and how it explained contact arrangements to Miss X. The Council agreed to apologise to Miss X and pay her £500 to recognise the injustice caused to her, and implement the service improvements necessary.

The complaint

1. Miss X complained the Council failed to carry out the recommendations it identified during its response to her complaint about the way the Council handled the adoption of her child. Miss X said the Council failed to provide adequate information from her child and did not respond to her contact. Miss X stated this caused her distress and frustration.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

2. We investigate complaints about ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’. In this statement, I have used the word fault to refer to these. We must also consider whether any fault has had an adverse impact on the person making the complaint. I refer to this as ‘injustice’. If there has been fault which has caused an injustice, we may suggest a remedy. (Local Government Act 1974, sections 26(1) and 26A(1), as amended)
3. If we are satisfied with an organisation’s actions or proposed actions, we can complete our investigation and issue a decision statement. (Local Government Act 1974, section 30(1B) and 34H(i), as amended)
4. Under the information sharing agreement between the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman and the Office for Standards in Education, Children’s Services and Skills (Ofsted), we will share this decision with Ofsted.

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How I considered this complaint

5. I discussed the complaint with Miss X on the telephone.
6. I read the documents the Council provided in response to my enquiries.
7. I considered the statutory guidance Getting the Best from Complaints and our Guidance on remedies.
8. Miss X and the Council now have an opportunity to comment on my draft decision. I will consider their comments before making a final decision.

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What I found

Adoption

9. A council can start care proceedings if it is worried about the safety of a child. The council can apply for an interim care order which decides where the child should live and who with.
10. If a council decides the child should be adopted it can apply for a placement order. This allows the council to place the child with suitable adopters. The final step in adoption is an adoption order. This gives full parental responsibility for the child to the approved adopters.
11. Letter box contact is a formal arrangement for the birth parents and adoptive parents to share information about the child. This is confidential and agreed through the court process. It usually takes the form of update letters.

Statutory complaint procedure

12. The law sets out a three-stage procedure for councils to follow when looking at complaints about children’s social care services. The accompanying statutory guidance, ‘Getting the Best from Complaints’, explains councils’ responsibilities in more detail.
13. The first stage of the procedure is local resolution. Councils have up to 20 working days to respond.
14. If a complainant is not happy with a council’s stage one response, they can ask that it is considered at stage two. At this stage of the procedure, councils appoint an investigator and an independent person who is responsible for overseeing the investigation. Councils have up to 13 weeks to complete stage two of the process from the date of request.
15. If a complainant is unhappy with the outcome of the stage two investigation, they can ask for a stage three review by an independent panel. The council must hold the panel within 30 days of the date of request, and then issue a final response within 20 days of the panel hearing.

What happened

Background information

16. Miss X had a child, G, who was born in 2014. For reasons that are not relevant to this investigation the Council initiated care proceedings and obtained an interim care order for G and they were placed in a foster care placement. Following the interim care order the Council obtained a Placement Order and G moved to pre-adoptive parents.
17. In 2020 Miss X learnt the pre-adoptive placement had broken down and applied to the court to revoke the placement order so she could have G returned to her care. The court dismissed the application and the Council placed G with new pre-adoptive parents. The court issued an adoption order for G in September 2021.

Complaint process

18. In August 2020 Miss X complained to the Council. She said the Council failed to keep her informed about significant events in G’s life. There were eight points of complaint which included Miss X had not had any letterbox contact from G for 6 years despite there being a court order and care plan that said she should.
19. The Council considered the complaint and upheld three elements including the complaint about letterbox contact. It partially upheld two elements and did not uphold three elements of the complaint. It apologised to Miss X for the upheld complaints. It offered Miss X a meeting to discuss the complaint. It also said Miss X could request a stage two investigation.
20. Miss X met with the Council in November 2020. The Council wrote to Miss X after the meeting to explain what it had done to address her complaint. It said it would contact Miss X about ongoing letter box contact.
21. Miss X asked the Council to consider her complaint at stage two of the statutory children’s complaint procedure. The Council appointed an Investigating Officer (IO) and an Independent Person (IP). They met with Miss X in December 2020.
22. The IO set out the statement of complaint in January 2021. There were 15 points of complaint about how the Council had managed G’s case and its communications with Miss X. It included the complaint about letterbox contact.
23. The IO considered all of the available documentary evidence, interviewed the available key Council staff members, and Miss X. They completed the investigation in February 2021. The investigation upheld six elements of complaint and partly upheld three. It did not uphold six elements. The IP agreed with the IO’s findings. It upheld Miss X’s complaint about letter box contact
24. The investigation report recommended the Council should:
• Ensure newly qualified social workers were provided with a high level of supervision and oversight of their work with children and families.
• Write to Miss X and set out arrangements for letterbox contact
• Write a letter of apology and explanation to G about the lack of letterbox contact for their file.
• Ensure contact arrangements were set out clearly in case files including how contact would fit within care planning and review process.
• Ensure Independent Reviewing Officers (IRO’s) had better oversight of contact arrangements and should escalate Council non-compliance appropriately.
• Consider developing a policy about how it would ensure birth parents were kept informed about their child in pre-adoptive placements.
• Remind team managers that contact with people should be responded to in a timely way and included on the case record.
• Ensure decisions about the participation of birth parents in adoption reviews was discussed between the social worker and IRO and clearly documented in the care records, and birth-parents were informed of those decisions.
• Remind IRO’s to record contact with the children’s guardian in the case record.
• Conduct a learning review as a result of the complaint to inform future practice.
• Ensure birth parents understood the reason why their child’s name may be changed.
• Consider supporting Miss X to provide information towards G’s life-story.
• Consider practice guidance to include birth parents in life story work.
25. The Council wrote an adjudication letter to Miss X in March 2021. It agreed with the investigation’s findings and recommendations, it made no reference to the complaints that were not upheld. It said it had already completed some of the recommendations. It said it would contact Miss X with the plans for maintaining letter box connection and would seek advice from her about how to present the information, details and scheduling in an appropriate format.
26. It said it would not develop a policy for communication with birth parents during pre-adoption placements as that should be covered in the care plans. It said it would like Miss X to contribute to its development of a policy around life story work with birth parents.
27. Miss X was dissatisfied with the Council’s response and asked it to consider her complaint at stage three. The Council said it paused the complaint process while G’s adoption placement was being considered by the Court.
28. Miss X told the Council in August 2021 she was still unclear about letterbox contact. The Council told Miss X the final decision about Letterbox contact would be made by the Court. In the meantime Miss X could send any documents or birthday cards or similar to the Council and it would add them to G’s file. They would be available for G to access should they wish to in the future.
29. The Court issued the adoption order for G in September 2021. Miss X contacted the Council and said she wanted to go to stage three of the complaint procedure.
30. The Council was in contact with Miss X to establish if she had the support of an advocate between September and the beginning of October 2021. In November 2021 the Council made arrangements for the stage three Panel hearing.
31. The Panel considered the complaint in December 2021. The Panel changed three complaint elements from partially upheld to upheld. It changed one from not upheld to upheld. It found the Council’s adjudication letter did not provide enough information on the complaints that were not upheld, and did not consider the overall impact on Miss X of all the faults identified.
32. It recommended the Council should:
• implement guidance for birth parents about who will keep them updated and in what circumstances;
• make all reasonable steps to locate and interview named practitioners in complaint investigations;
• ensure its adjudication letters followed the guidance Getting the Best from Complaints, and it clearly documented its reasoning if it deviated from the guidance;
• ensure the adjudicating officer maintained oversight until the actions and recommendations from any investigation were complete; and
• offer Miss X a financial payment to recognise the distress caused by the upheld complaints.
33. The Council wrote to Miss X. It agreed with the Panel’s findings and apologised for the faults identified. It offered Miss X £4500 to recognise the injustice caused to her by the upheld complaints. The Council asked Miss X to meet with it in order that it could apologise in person. It did not make reference to the Panel’s recommendations other than the offer of financial payment.
34. Miss X was dissatisfied with the Council’s response and complained to us in February 2022.
35. Miss X met with the Council in March 2022. She told it she had received one letter box contact about G in January 2022, but it was very short and she had not got letters covering the seven years that were missed.
36. The Council emailed Miss X the following week. It provided her with the contact details of a social worker in Council B, who was now responsible for G’s case. The Council said Miss X’s should ask them the questions about letterbox contact.

Further information

37. In response to my enquiries the Council provided me with evidence it completed most of the agreed stage two recommendations by September 2021 and that it had paid Miss X £4500.
38. The Council did not provide evidence it had:
• reminded IRO’s of their responsibilities around discussing and accurately recording decision in case records;
• addressed the issue of letterbox contact with Miss X;
• developed a method of ensuring birth parents understood the reasons why their child’s name may be changed; or
• any of the stage three service improvement recommendations.

My findings

Complaint handling

39. If a council has investigated something under the statutory children’s complaint procedure, the Ombudsman would not normally re-investigate it unless we consider the investigation was flawed. However, we may look at whether a council properly considered the findings and recommendations of the independent investigation.
40. The Council considered the matter through the statutory complaint procedure. The stage three Panel’s purpose is to consider the adequacy of the stage two investigation. Where it found the investigation had not been robust it made recommendations to improve service. It upheld four of the findings the stage two either did not uphold or partially upheld. Although the Council did not adequately recognise or respond to the Panel recommendations in its final response to Miss X, the overall findings of the children’s statutory complaints procedure can be relied upon. I have not investigated them further.
41. The Council delayed in completing the complaint procedure. It offered Miss X a meeting to discuss the stage 1 response in August 2020, but did not arrange that meeting until two and half months later, after which Miss X requested a stage two investigation. The Council paused the stage three Panel as the ongoing court case had a bearing on the investigation, which was appropriate. However, Miss X contacted the Council in September 2021 and asked it to progress to stage three. The Council did not arrange this until November and the Panel hearing was not until December, this was a further delay of three months. Although the Council stated it was waiting to see if Miss X had an advocate there is no evidence Miss X had requested that and she did not have an advocate during the Panel meeting. The overall delay of five and half months caused Miss X unnecessary distress and frustration.

The Council’s remedies

42. I reviewed the Council’s responses to Miss X at each stage of the complaint procedure. It provided an appropriate apology for each of the upheld complaints and met with Miss X to apologise in person. There is no fault in the Council’s actions to remedy injustice identified through the statutory investigation.
43. The Council paid Miss X £4500 as a symbolic payment to recognise the distress caused to her by the upheld complaints. That amount is in line with our Guidance on Remedies and is an appropriate symbolic payment for the distress caused to Miss X by the faults identified through the complaint procedure.

The service improvement recommendations

44. The Council evidenced it implemented most of the stage two recommendations through policy development and practice improvement. However, it has not provided any evidence it completed the service improvement recommendations outlined in paragraph 26. The Council did not acknowledge any of the Panel recommendations at stage three, save for the payment to Miss X. That was fault and caused Miss X frustration that the faults may have re-occurred to other families.
45. In its adjudication letter the Council said it would like Miss X to contribute to its development of a policy around life story work with birth parents. There is no evidence it took any steps to include Miss X. That was fault and raised Miss X’s expectations about how the Council would improve its service with her involvement.

Letterbox contact

46. Miss X complained she had not received the letterbox contact from G for six years in 2020, this became seven years in 2021. The Council upheld that element of Miss X’s complaint at all stages of the procedure and agreed it would write to her to explain letterbox contact. The Council told Miss X the final decision would be made by the court, which is correct. It offered to hold documents on her behalf in the interim. Whilst this would provide contact for G in the future should they wish to see it, it did not address the lack of information about G to Miss X.
47. The Council provided Miss X with the contact details of a social worker in Council B in March 2022, which was 20 months after she initially complained about it and 18 months after the Council said it would discuss the contact with her. At the date of this decision Miss X still did not understand how much information she should receive in the letterbox contact, how often they will be or whether she will receive the missed 7 years of correspondence. This caused Miss X further uncertainty, distress and time and trouble in finding out about the contact from G.

Contact with the Council

48. I have reviewed the contact Miss X had with the Council since the end of the children’s statutory complaint procedure. There is no evidence the Council has ignored Miss X’s contact or failed to respond during this time. The Council did state it would provide a further update to Miss X in September 2022, however this decision provides that update on the Council’s actions.

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Agreed action

49. Within one month the council agreed to:
• contact Miss X and apologise for the frustration, distress, raised expectations and time and trouble caused to her by the faults identified above;
• pay Miss X £500 to recognise the injustice I identified as being additional to that identified by the statutory investigation itself; and
• contact the social worker in Council B on Miss X’s behalf and establish the ongoing arrangements for letterbox contact. It should ask Council B to provide Miss X with information about what she can expect the contact to include, how often she will receive it and if she will be provided with the missed seven years letterbox contact. The Council should provide this information to Miss X in an accessible written format, along with all the contact details for the relevant social worker.
50. Within two months the Council will develop its policies and procedure to:
• ensure decisions about the participation of birth parents in adoption reviews are discussed between the social worker and IRO and clearly documented in the care records, and birth-parents are informed of those decisions;
• ensure IRO’s record contact with the children’s guardian in case records;
• ensure birth parents understand the reason why their child’s name may be changed;
• implement guidance for birth parents about who will keep them updated and in what circumstances;
• ensure all reasonable steps are taken to locate and interview named practitioners in complaint investigations;
• ensure its adjudication letters follows the guidance Getting the Best from Complaints, and clearly documents its reasoning if it deviates from the guidance; and
• ensure the adjudicating officer maintains oversight of complaints until the actions and recommendations are completed.
51. The Council will provide us with evidence it has completed these recommendations.

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Final decision

52. I have completed my investigation. I found fault leading to injustice and the council agreed to my recommendations to remedy that injustice.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman