Taking Legal Action against LA

[KatKat10]

Has anyone taken legal action against a LA, if so was this successful and on what grounds? Has anyone gone straight to legal action without going through the official complaints procedure first?
There has been consistent failure to provide essential documents and lies on legal documents that can be proven with evidence based facts and documents. At first I thought it was the social worker being difficult, but as more comes to light, it has become clear the manager was blocking things and not allowing documents and emails to be responded to. I want the LA fully investigated for their failings.

[Panny]

Not exactly legal action (because I couldn't afford it) but I went through the stages of complaints and onto the ombudsman and my complaint was upheld, I received an apology and substantial (although pitiful in relation to the damage that was caused) compensation. The whole process took nearly two years and was incredibly stressful.

Unfortunately, I have recently had to make another complaint about continuous and multiple failings and will have to go through it all again.

If you can afford to take legal action rather than go through the ombudsman, do it.

[KatKat10]

Thank you Panny for your response. I get the impression that LA's appear to think parents won't complain due to fear of reprisals. I will be taking a complaint forward and pursuing this all the way, they cannot get away with what they have done. If it can stop other family's suffering, then it is worth it. It's not about money, it is about exposing the unprofessional behavior and the emotional stress caused by the untruths.

[HH_Dad]

Hi KatKat10,

My partner and I were treated dreadfully a few years ago when a hospital (wrongly) alleged that our then 14-month old son had 'multiple fractures'. Despite the fact that - at the time - there was no second opinion and ignoring the fact that neither my partner or I had ever been in trouble with the law before, we were not known to Social Services and we both had jobs (she is a teacher for goodness sake), the Local Authority waded in very heavy-handed, made us (yes, made us) sign a Section 20 document and treated us like scum. They told lie after lie about us, refused to give us documents we were entitled to and to top it off they accidentally sent me documents for another family entirely which contained names, addresses, phone numbers, dates of births etc.

When the whole saga was over and it was proved we had done nothing wrong, we complained to everyone we possibly could (to the GMC, to the Police, to the LA and I wrote to my local MP and even had the BBC send a reporter to meet us). We have a family friend who has many connections and knows people in positions of authority. We were asking the LA for recompense for where we were out of pocket due to what they had done to us. They kept promising us a decision by certain dates which came and went. So, eventually our friend who was helping us phoned the person at the LA we were dealing with and said that if they did not agree to pay us what we were asking for (it wasn't a huge amount) then he would personally pay for us to sue them. I received a phone call from the LA soon after asking for my bank details and the money was transferred to my bank account by 5:00pm the same day. I can provide more information/proof or whatever if you PM me.

[Panny]

Really sad that having friends in high places and money can get you what you want.

Fight if you can. I think too many people take what social services say at face value and just accept abuse from them. And that is what they are- abusers. I feel I have been psychologically violated by them and the more I fight back the more they use their authority to crush me in order to stop me from fighting back.

Be aware they don't fight fair. Now I've revealed them to be liars and to have failed on multiple counts and mis quoted other professionals, they are trying to take my child away, using my mental health as a weapon.

The case where I got compensation through ombudsman was with SENAT rather than SS. They didn't play as dirty. Many sw are devoid of emapthy, possibly sadistic.