Ombudsman refused to investigate complaint but made errors

[CY23]

Hello, I complained to my council about not considering my child as Looked After when they placed him with me. I also complained about some other things. The council were responsible for many delays in my SGO proceedings. The reason for this was they were using an unlawful policy. They had a lower rate for their kinship carers. They used this in their calculation in the support plan so we could not finalise. This went on for months. They awarded me a ‘pre- SGO allowance’ equivalent to the SGO allowance each week until it was finalised. They paid a lower rate because they had calculated it wrong in the SGO support plan ( using the lower Kinship rate) so our weekly allowance was not equal to the SGO allowance. They had written two emails stating this and giving an undertaking to pay twelve weeks backdated allowance. However, they only paid eleven weeks and this was at the incorrect, lower rate. Later, they corrected the rate going forward to the correct rate- they refused to correct the backdated amount. So from Nov to Sept they started to pay the correct ‘equal to the SGO rate’ from July to Sept but won’t correct the rate from Nov to Sept. Through the formal complaint process they have said they corrected it in July due to an uplift. This is not true. They changed it from the lesser Kinship rate to the mainstream foster rate. They won’t accept this and won’t backdate the correct rate- even though I have two emails saying they will backdate equal to the SGO rate. The manager says in her report that they were to pay allowance equivalent to the SGO rate.
Also, they said that they would pay the travel costs to my child’s therapy in the SGO support plan but because of their delay (using an unlawful policy so we could not finalise the SGO order for quite some time) my child did 18 months of therapy where we paid the travel costs and now they have refused to honour what they said.
In a court hearing in May 2022, a judge told the connected persons manager that our case was not a private arrangement and it was shameful that we had no support. The manager agreed and the judge asked her to sort it. She said she would. She changed the support plan to include the wording,’ child was previously looked after’ and all the support was put into the SGO support plan. Then, in June 2023 just before our final hearing, the council removed the wording and support from our support plan and said it had been put in by error. We had to ask to adjourn and obtain legal advice. Our solicitor made us aware that we should have received a fostering allowance and said the previous judge was correct. He recommended that we make a formal complaint. We made a formal complaint in December 2023. None of our complaints were upheld and the council delayed. We had our final decision for stage 3 in March 2025. We complained to the Ombudsman in June 2025. We have just received a decision and he is not going to investigate as 1) we are out of time- he said we should have complained back in May 2022 when the Judge made his comments. No one explained this to us. We only understood that calling him Looked After meant he got support in the SGO support plan. Surely if a judge said to the council, it’s not a private arrangement, they should have explained to us and paid us backdated fostering allowance?
It wasn’t a private arrangement as mum had told her social worker she didn’t want child and social worker had asked her family members first to care for child, before asking us. At the stage three panel meeting, the strategic lead admitted that the duty arose but said it was lucky that we stepped in so they didn’t have to. When they asked us, they did not specify the arrangement and only talked about it later at a CIN meeting at school where they explained it and gave us a booklet. This was three weeks after child came to live with us. Also, when the wording went into the support plan in May 2022, I had to speak to child tax credits and due to a misunderstanding of the term ‘fostering’ I lost my child tax credits for three years. I had no fostering allowance or child tax credits only £21 child benefit. We were in financial hardship and had to rely on credit cards. After taking on the care of our child, we now have £20,000 credit card debt due to no CTC or F/A. The council admitted to fault here at stage two complaint. They apologised for the confusion of language and offered £1000 in compensation but no mention of this in stage three. We now have a SGO and weekly allowance but this pays off our credit card minimum payment each month. We are still in financial hardship. Our SGO finishes in three years. We are in our late 50’s. We don’t know how we will pay this credit card debt then. We are left with this for the rest of our life. We never had debt before. We have lost all hope with the Ombudsman. The Ombudsman also says 2) there is not enough injustice. We do not feel that the Ombudsman has the correct facts. Also, the Ombudsman has got other facts wrong. We complained about the council not safeguarding our child by calling it a private arrangement. We said that left him at risk of his mother taking him from our care at her whim. The Ombudsman said that was just our worries and it was good that it didn’t happen. BUT it did happen. His mum took him on a contact visit and absconded with him to another part of the country and refused to bring him home, even for his CAMHs appointment. Mum did not have his medication. This was after he had lived with us for over a year and mum had little contact and there were times where the social worker told us she had to be supervised and told us no unsupervised contact due to alcohol, drug issues and ranting angrily and throwing chairs in SW’s office and suicide attempts. So, the Ombudsman has this wrong. It did happen. There was a court case about it. As social workers refused to check on him, I made an emergency application to court and the Judge ordered him back to my care. After being unsuccessful in the stage1,2 and 3 with the council, I wrote a detailed account and put all evidence to back everything up. I have read that I can ask the Ombudsman to review but I don’t know whether to do this. I don’t trust the Ombudsman now- they couldn’t have read my submission and evidence correctly. I think even if they did allow it to be investigated, because they’ve said not enough injustice- it would not be upheld. The other option seems to be challenging in court. I don’t know if I am out of time for this. I believe that the Ombudsman is considering the wrong date looking at May 2022 re: the Judges comments. I thought that Ombudsman were not allowed to look at anything that happened in court? Please could you kindly advise me of which option would be the best to take? .

[Robin D]

You can complain about ombudsman decisions under certain conditions or take them to judicial review. https://www.lgo.org.uk/information-cent ... ur-service

If you still have the services of a solicitor I suggest a chat to them first. If not, https://weareadvocate.org.uk may be interested. The provide a free barrister but you need to move very quickly. However, you seem to have all the facts to hand so filling out the form may not be too onerous. I used the pro bono scheme about a decade ago with great success in an entirely separate matter.

Good luck ... Robin

[CY23]

Thank you for your reply. I don’t have access to our solicitor now. He very kindly offered pro bono representation at our SGO hearing and I would not like to ask him again. So thank you for the link, I will have a look.

[Suzie, FRG Adviser]

Dear CY23

Welcome back to the kinship carers’ discussion board. Thank you for your further post. I am Suzie, Family Rights Group’s online adviser.

I am very sorry to hear about the difficulties you continue to experience. You explain that you are still suffering financial hardship. Having exhausted children’s services’ complaint process and as your complaints were not upheld you rightly complained to the Local Government Ombudsman (LGO).

Unfortunately, the LGO has now replied to your complaint to them stating they will not investigate because in their view:

• Your complaint is out of time
• There is not enough injustice

When deciding whether or not to investigate the LGO follows their assessment code.

You do not accept the LGO’s decision and have lost faith in the organisation. You believe that they have not got all the facts and have got other facts wrong.

You are querying how to proceed.

You have already had helpful advice from another kinship carer.

You can consider:

• Complaining to the LGO about the service you have received; please see here for details about how to do this.
• Complaining to the LGO about their decision not to investigate. Please see here for more information about how to complain about their decision.
• Seek specialist legal advice from a lawyer if you are considering applying for a judicial review. Please see this advice about judicial review It is a complex and specialist area of law and strict criteria must be met to pursue this route. It is not an area of advice that we can provide. There are details about accessing specialist legal advice on judicial review on the last page of the advice sheet. The LGO’s website warns that ‘If you choose to bring a claim for Judicial Review which we successfully defend, we will look to recover our reasonable costs to protect public funds. Typically this could mean you paying £2,000 to £3,000 or more depending on the complexity of the claim’. Therefore, it is advisable to consult with a solicitor who is qualified to advise on this if it is an option you are thinking of pursuing.

The other options for complaining beyond children’s services i.e. contacting your MP, councillor or the Secretary of State are set out in this table here . Although, they cannot overturn children’s services or the LGO’s decision, you may find it helpful to discuss the difficulties you have and continue to experience and the attempts you have made to challenge them.

I hope that this helps a little in thinking through what you decide to do next. I am sorry that the LGO did not investigate as requested.

Best wishes

Suzie

[CY23]

Thank you Susie for your reply and all the information. I am very grateful to you. I will post back if anything develops. Thanks again.

[CY23]

Following on from my post. I have asked the Ombudsman for a review. I am not hopeful as from research, it seems that the Ombudsman is refusing a lot of cases and people are complaining that it feels like they are siding with the council. This is what I have felt through my complaint process. The tribunal did not investigate properly. They just did not take the facts into account. Two examples of this are: 1) my council were using an unlawful policy to calculate the rate of SGO allowance. They had two booklets- one with their Kinship rate and one with their mainstream foster rate. The kinship rate was lower. Even though I highlighted this to the council they refused to accept it was unlawful. Therefore, we could not finalise the SGO as the rate in the support plan was less than the mainstream foster allowance rate. This caused significant delays. In the complaint, the council still denied this- the IIO and the stage three panel agreed with the council. In their reports they say that the delays were our fault due to legal negotiation of the support plans. The IIO reports that we kept talking about an unlawful policy but she could not locate the law we were talking about. We sent her the Judicial review case law and the two booklets showing the different rates. The stage three panel agreed with this saying they could find no fault of delay from the council. Surely, if the council are using an unlawful policy and the rate was wrong so we could not finalise them that is the council’s fault for delay. No one through the complaint process has acknowledged that the council were using an unlawful policy by applying a lower rate than foster carers have to their allowance. And 2) I was challenging the council over the Looked After status of my child. The council wrongly called it a private arrangement when the social worker asked me to care for the child when mum had told her she didn’t want to care for him anymore. Mum was having discussions with her SW (that we were not privy to) that she did not want to care for her child and wanted him to live elsewhere. The SW invited me to a meeting where she told me that she had asked the child’s aunties and grandmother to care for him and they said no. She asked me to care for the child and I agreed. She did not explain any care arrangements at that meeting. She said that she would try to secure funds and told me to keep any receipts for expenses. Three weeks after the child was living with me, I attended a Child in need meeting where the social worker called it a private arrangement. The Headmaster queried this and said in his opinion, social care had manipulated the situation. The SW rared up in the headmaster quite loudly and it got heated. The SW gave me a booklet on fostering and said that she would have to speak to mum about transferring the child’s benefits. Birth mum was not at the meeting. Birth mum later refused to give up the child’s benefits. SW did not verbally explain the legal framework. Another SW did that about a month later- two months after child began living with me. Therefore, I believe under the law, the duty arose at the time mum told SW she did not want to care for the child. The SW acted under the duty asking family members to care for child. As I understand the council can only side step this duty if they explain and I agree to care for him under a private arrangement. This simply did not happen. During the stage three panel, I explained this and the Strategic lead for the council conceded that the duty arose and said,’it was lucky that you stepped in so we didn’t have to’. The stage three panel decision upheld that it was a private arrangement because the council are allowed to side step the duty- but they did not recognise that under the law, it was not discussed at the meeting at the time where the SW asked us to care for the child. How can the panel not follow the law. There is evidence in the child in need minutes that the fostering booklet was given three weeks after this meeting and other evidence. Both the IIO and the stage three panel have just ignored evidence and the law in their findings. They have done this throughout my case even when I have put the evidence in front of them. I don’t understand how decisions can be just in this way and there is nothing I can do. Is there any way to challenge the actual complaint process and the IIO and stage three panel as they have just ignored evidence and the law. That cannot be right surely? If there is any advice you can give me about how I can challenge this process I would be very grateful? The Ombudsman says I am out of time. I have appealed this with evidence of the date my solicitor made me aware of the facts- I have sent an email where my solicitor has advised me to complain which is within the twelve month period and I’ve asked him to write a letter confirming this but I don’t think the Ombudsman will investigate as they seem to be refusing everyone. I know I can apply for JR for the Ombudsman but there must be something I can do about the IIO and stage three panel ignoring the law and evidence. Thank you if you can help.

[CY23]

Forgive my double post. I have just remembered reading a court judgement where the ‘looked after status’ of a child was not considered or investigated before a SGO was made. This meant no support was allowed in the SGO. It was challenged in court and the Judge ruled that the child’s legal status should have been determined before making the SGO order. This happened in my SGO proceedings. The question of the child’s legal status came up and the judge ordered the council to do a brief report, which they obviously said it was a private arrangement. I was not allowed to challenge this or say why or show my evidence that I believe showed he was previously Looked After. My Judge said that he would not consider this in these proceedings. I thought he was wrong at the time. I thought the child’s legal status should be determined in those proceedings as the support in the SGO depended on it. The Judge in the court case I read ruled the same way. Do you think it’s possible to challenge this? thank you

[Suzie, FRG Adviser]

Dear CY23

Thank you for your further posts. I am sorry that you are still in a difficult situation trying to pursue your complaints. I can see that you raise very reasonable arguments and have highlighted many inconsistencies.

Unfortunately, there is very little that I can add to my previous advice. You have followed all the right procedures to challenge decisions and formalise your complaints. As your complaint was not resolved within Children’s Services’ complaints procedure you escalated it to the Local Government Ombudsman (LGO). That is the next step if you dispute the outcome of children’s services’ final decision on your complaints. As the LGO declined to investigate you are now asking the LGO to review their decision. You are also aware that you can get legal advice from a specialist solicitor if you are considering judicial review.

I understand your argument about the child’s legal status not being clarified in the family court proceedings when the SGO was made. However, I understand that you have challenged via complaints and the court case concluded some time ago so there seems to be no further process to challenge.

You can of course consider getting specific legal advice from a solicitor.

You are aware that you can contact your local councillor, MP and or the Secretary of State to express your frustration and concerns about the processes you have been through and their outcomes.

I am sorry that I do not have any further suggestions.

Please do post back if you have any further queries.

With best wishes

Suzie

[CY23]

Thank you for your reply