Summary: We cannot investigate Mr X’s complaint that the Council organised his supervised contact with his child during his working hours, which Mr X said resulted in a loss of income. This is because Mr X could have raised the matters during court proceedings and it is reasonable to have expected him to do so.

The complaint

1. Mr X complained the Council failed to provide him with sufficient notice for supervised contact with his child. Mr X said this led to a loss of income from his job.
2. Mr X says the matter caused him financial difficulties.
3. Mr X wants the Council to reimburse his lost earnings.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

4. The Local Government Act 1974 sets out our powers but also imposes restrictions on what we can investigate.
5. The law says we cannot normally investigate a complaint when someone could take the matter to court. However, we may decide to investigate if we consider it would be unreasonable to expect the person to go to court. (Local Government Act 1974, section 26(6)(c), as amended)
6. We have the power to start or end an investigation into a complaint about actions the law allows us to investigate. We may decide not to start or continue with an investigation if we think the issues could reasonably be or have been mentioned as part of the legal proceedings regarding a closely related matter. (Local Government Act 1974, sections 24A(6) and 34B(8), as amended, section 34(B))
7. We investigate complaints about ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’, which we call ‘fault’. We must also consider whether any fault has had an adverse impact on the person making the complaint, which we call ‘injustice’. We provide a free service, but must use public money carefully. We do not start or continue an investigation if we decide we cannot achieve the outcome someone wants. (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended, section 34(B))

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How I considered this complaint

8. I considered information provided by the complainant.
9. I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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My assessment

10. Mr X has a child, Y. In summer 2024, a court granted the Council an Interim Care Order for Y. The court ordered the Council to organise supervised contact between Mr X and Y.
11. Mr X complained the Council organised contact during his working hours which resulted in a loss of earnings.
12. In its complaint response, the Council explained it would not consider his complaint and signposted him to take legal advice about the matter.

Analysis

13. The court decided Mr X should have supervised contact. It is reasonable to expect Mr X to have raised the matter of contact with his solicitor or directly with the court during care proceedings about the timing of his contact. Mr X’s complaint is too closely related to the matters the court considered. Because it is reasonable to have expected Mr X to have raised the matter of his contact with his child during court proceedings, we cannot investigate this complaint.
14. In any case, the Ombudsman’s Guidance on Remedies explains we do not normally recommend remedies that reimburse loss of earnings. Even if we decided it was not reasonable for Mr X to raise the matter of his contact with the court, we cannot usually, on balance, prove a clear and causal link between the fault and the claimed injustice of lost earnings. There are frequently other factors, personal circumstances and choices involved. Such payments are therefore best resolved by the courts. Where complainants are only seeking such reimbursement, we may decide to end our investigation because we cannot achieve the sought outcome. As a result, we will not investigate this complaint.

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Final decision

15. We cannot investigate Mr X’s complaint because it is reasonable to have expected Mr X to have raised the matter during court proceedings.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman