Summary: We will not investigate Ms X’s complaint about the Council not alerting her or acting to promote contact with her children in line with a court order when there were concerns about her ex-partner and one of her children was allegedly self-harming. We cannot consider matters that are properly for courts to decide, and we could not make recommendations about contact or remedies based on contact issues.

The complaint

1. Ms X said the Council failed to alert her when there were concerns about her children in the care of her ex-partner and one of her children was self-harming. She said her ex-partner’s new partner was providing care when she could have been contacted as she still had parental responsibility. She said the children had been alienated against her and her ex-partner was failing to promote contacted as required by a court order. She wanted a financial award.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

2. The Local Government Act 1974 sets out our powers but also imposes restrictions on what we can investigate.
3. 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)
4. 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:

• further investigation would not lead to a different outcome, or
• there is no worthwhile outcome achievable by our investigation.

(Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended, section 34(B))

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How I considered this complaint

5. I considered information provided by the complainant.
6. I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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My assessment

7. The residence and contact arrangements for Ms X’s children were subject to a non-recent court order. The adherence of her ex-partner to that is a matter in respect of which she would have a right to go to court it would be reasonable to use. There is no evidence in the correspondence that the decision that the children should live with the ex-partner’s new partner is one taken by the Council. Even if it was, the matter of residence is still one only a court could decide in the event of a dispute. Investigation by us would be unlikely to lead to a finding that the Council should have intervened to promote contact between Ms X and her children, or to encourage their return to her. That the Council could have contacted Ms X after the alleged concerns about her ex-partner does not mean we could conclude that would have led to improved contact. This is because, while Ms X says there has been alienation, we could not say that was the cause of the reported views of her children about contacting her. Ultimately, the complaint centres on matters of the contact and residency arrangements for children, which we cannot investigate. Investigating the matters complained of here would be unlikely to lead to a worthwhile outcome.

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Final decision

8. We will not investigate Ms X’s complaint because doing so would be unlikely to lead to a worthwhile outcome as the complaint centres on matters of contact and residence that only a court could decide. We could not therefore make any recommendations about remedy.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman