Summary: Miss X complained the Council failed to arrange contact with her grandchildren and respond to her queries on the matter. The Council was at fault which caused Miss X upset and uncertainty and meant she missed out on contact with her grandchildren. The Council has agreed to apologise, put measures in place to ensure she has contact going forward and make a payment to Miss X.

The complaint

1. Miss X complained the Council failed to arrange contact with her grandchildren who are in foster care. She also complained the Council has failed to respond to her repeated queries on the matter. She says this has caused her anxiety and depression as she constantly worries about her two grandchildren. She wants the Council to organise the contact with her grandchildren and improve its communication with her.

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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 significant injustice, or that could cause injustice to others in the future we may suggest a remedy. (Local Government Act 1974, sections 26(1) and 26A(1), as amended)
3. We cannot investigate late complaints unless we decide there are good reasons. Late complaints are when someone takes more than 12 months to complain to us about something a council has done. (Local Government Act 1974, sections 26B and 34D, as amended)
4. We cannot investigate a complaint about the start of court action or what happened in court. (Local Government Act 1974, Schedule 5/5A, paragraph 1/3, as amended)
5. 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)
6. Under our information sharing agreement, we will share this decision with the Office for Standards in Education, Children’s Services and Skills (Ofsted).

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What I have and have not investigated

7. I have decided to investigate events back to February 2022. I consider there is good reason why Miss X did not complain to us sooner as she gave the Council an opportunity to act on her concerns. I will not investigate events before February 2022 as I consider Miss X could have complained to us when the Council reduced her contact with her grandchildren.
8. I cannot investigate the grandchildren’s care arrangements as these were decided by a court. We cannot investigate what happened in court.

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How I considered this complaint

9. I have discussed the complaint with Miss X and considered the information she provided. I also considered information provided by the Council.
10. Miss X and the Council have had an opportunity to comment on my draft decision. I considered their comments before making a final decision.

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What I found

Care Orders and family contact

11. Family Courts can make Care Orders which place children in the care of a council because of concerns about the adequacy of the parents’ care causing significant harm to the child.
12. The Council has a general duty to promote contact with wider family members such as grandparents or siblings.

The Council’s complaints process

13. The Council says it will acknowledge all complaints within five working days, setting out a complaint handling plan which gives a timescale for the Council to respond. The Council says this is usually 15 working days but can be longer in more complex cases. Where the investigation will take longer the Council will explain this to the complainant.
14. If the complainant remains unhappy with the Council’s response it will decide whether a further investigation (a stage two investigation) would add value or refer the complainant to the Ombudsman.

What happened

15. The following is not intended to be a full account of everything that happened in this period, nor does it refer to all the records I have considered. It is a summary of the key events and facts relevant to this complaint.
16. Miss X is grandmother to Y and Z and lives in a different area to them. In 2021 a court ordered Y and Z be placed in local authority care in separate placements. At first Miss X had face-to-face contact with Y and Z three times a year, with weekly phone calls alternating between Y and Z. Miss X had to travel to see Y and Z.
17. In early 2022 the Council changed Miss X’s face-to-face contact to twice a year and said Miss X should arrange this direct with Y and Z’s foster carers. Miss X contacted the Council to say she was not happy with the reduction in contact. The Council’s records show it had no record of the assessment to reduce Miss X’s contact with Y and Z. The Council carried out a new assessment and decided Y and Z should have face-to-face contact with Miss X three times a year, with phone calls every six weeks.
18. From April to September 2022 Miss X contacted the Council on several occasions asking for an update on contact arrangements. The records show the Council rarely responded to Miss X’s calls during this time. Miss X complained to the Council in October 2022.
19. The Council responded to Miss X’s complaint in February 2023. It apologised for the lack of communication. It said Miss X could contact a team manager in future if she continued to receive no replies to her calls. In March 2023 Miss X asked the Council to escalate her complaint to stage two. She said communication remained poor and she remained unhappy with her level of contact.
20. A service manager from the Council met with Miss X in April 2023. They explained Y and Z’s care plan to Miss X and listened to her concerns. On 12 April 2023 the manager emailed Miss X with the following agreed actions:
• Agree consistent levels of communication between Y and Z’s social worker and Miss X.
• Review Y and Z’s family time arrangements with Miss X, including exploring telephone calls every six weeks.
• Reimburse Miss X for family time arrangements.
• Explore how Miss X could be part of future Child Care Reviews.
21. In October 2023 Miss X complained to the Council again. She said the Council had not followed up on any of its agreed actions and communication remained poor, even when she tried to contact managers. The Council’s records show the service manager, who met with Miss X, left earlier in 2023 and it had no record of them completing the actions. A social worker contacted Miss X to discuss contact arrangements and to deliver gifts to Y and Z. They said they would be in touch about a Christmas face-to-face visit with Y and Z. The Council also offered Miss X a meeting with a new service manager.
22. In December 2023 the Council proposed a contact date between Miss X, Y and Z. Miss X was unhappy it was on a Sunday and refused to agree to the date.
23. Miss X contacted the Council again in January 2024. She said contact arrangements kept changing and it was costing her money to travel to see Y and Z. The Council said it was happy to look at supporting Miss X with the cost of visits and would send her a schedule for future contact. Miss X remained unhappy and said she wanted to complain.
24. The Council responded to Miss X in February 2024. It said it was now satisfied a social worker had contacted Miss X and recent communication was of a good standard. Miss X continued to contact the Council. She said nobody was responding to her calls and she wanted to visit Y and Z.
25. The Council carried out a new family time assessment in April 2024. It accepted it had not reviewed contact arrangements since 2022, during which time inconsistencies had developed in Y and Z’s contact arrangements. The assessment recommended Miss X have scheduled supervised face-to-face contact with Y and Z three times a year. The Council would arrange the visits in advance.
26. On 19 April 2024 Miss X contacted the Council to say she was travelling to Y and Z’s area in a few days and asked if she could see them. A Council social worker said they would have to check with the centre which accommodated Miss X’s visits. On checking they said it was not possible to organise contact with Y and Z. Miss X complained to the Ombudsman.
27. The Council scheduled the next supervised face-to-face contact between Miss X, Y and Z for 30 July 2024. The Council tried to confirm this with Miss X on 19 July 2024. Miss X refused to agree to supervised contact and the visit did not take place.

The Council’s response to my enquiries

28. The Council accepts the service it has provided Miss X has not been good enough and has set out the action it intends to take. In response to my enquiries the Council had already assigned Y and Z new social workers in July 2024 and shared Miss X’s complaint issues with the new social worker and their manager. The Council has also decided to:
• Complete a new family time assessment by 23 September 2024.
• Offer Miss X new dates for visits with Y and Z. The Council says it must supervise these visits at first and it will decide on future supervision in its family time assessment.
• Establish Miss X’s previous expenses in visiting Y and Z that Miss X wishes to claim for and agree what expenses it will fund for Miss X’s future visits.
• Add an action to future Care Review meetings to consider sharing the minutes of the meetings with Miss X if considered appropriate.
• Pay Miss X £500 for the delay, time and trouble she has suffered.
29. Miss X says the new social worker continues to not respond to her calls and messages.

My findings

30. In 2022 the Council decided Miss X should have face-to-face contact with Y and Z three times a year, with phone calls every six weeks. It said Miss X could arrange the face-to-face contact direct with Y and Z’s foster carers. Having decided the level of contact, the Council had a duty to ensure the contact happened. The Council failed to do this. This was fault. This caused Miss X upset at not seeing or speaking to Y and Z, and uncertainty over when she would see or speak to Y and Z again.
31. Miss X tried to speak to the Council on many occasions, when the contact did not happen, but it did not respond. The Council failed to have processes in place to not only note Miss X’s concerns, but act on them and ensure it resolved the situation. This was fault. When Miss X complained, there is no evidence of the Council setting out or agreeing a complaint handling plan with Miss X. The Council took four months to respond to Miss X’s first complaint. This is fault and added to Miss X’s upset and uncertainty.
32. When the Council did act on Miss X’s complaint, a service manager from the Council met with her in April 2023. They apologised for the service Miss X had received and agreed several actions to put things right. However, the service manager left the Council shortly after the meeting. The Council accepts it failed to carry out any of the agreed actions. When the Council discovered this in October 2023 it did reach out to Miss X to arrange contact with Y and Z. However, it did not follow through on other actions such as agreeing consistent communication and a new family time assessment. This was fault.
33. The Council accepts the service it has provided Miss X has not been good enough. This has caused Miss X upset and uncertainty over a prolonged period. The Council has set out the actions it intends to take to address the issues Miss X has faced. I am satisfied these actions go some way to remedying the injustice Miss X has faced and resolving the issues going forward. However, there is still a mismatch between Miss X’s expectations and the Councils proposed actions. Following the new family time assessment, the Council must ensure it is clear what contact Miss X will have with Y and Z and what communication she can expect from the Council.
34. The Council’s complaint process sets out no firm timescales for responding to complaints. It is reliant on the Council agreeing an individual complaint plan for each complaint. The Ombudsman launched our Complaint Handling Code in February 2024. The Code sets out a single standard for complaint handling in local councils and will address the issues with the Council’s processes. The Council is currently taking part in a pilot for the Code.

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Agreed action

35. Within one month of the final decision the Council has agreed to take the following action:
1. Apologise to Miss X for the upset and uncertainty caused by its failure to ensure she has contact with Y and Z and respond to her repeated concerns about the lack of contact. We publish guidance on remedies which sets out our expectations for how organisations should apologise effectively to remedy injustice. The organisation should consider this guidance in making the apology.
2. Carry out its proposed actions set out in paragraph 25 of this decision, including paying Miss X £500 to recognise the impact of the Council’s failings.
3. Agree a consistent communication plan with Miss X regarding her contact with Y and Z and with the Council. This should establish when Miss X will receive updates on their progress and when the Council will and will not respond to her communication. The Council should set this out in writing to Miss X once this is agreed.
36. The Council should provide us with evidence it has complied with the above actions.

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Final decision

37. I have completed my investigation and found fault by the Council which caused an injustice, which the Council has agreed to remedy.

Investigator’s decision on behalf of the Ombudsman

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman