Local democracy

Agenda item

LOCAL GOVERNMENT AND SOCIAL CARE OMBUDSMAN - REVIEW OF LOCAL GOVERNMENT COMPLAINTS 2017/18

The Assistant Director of the Chief Executive’s Office will submit Document “W” which summarises the number of complaints and investigations undertaken by the Ombudsman for the year ended 31 March 2018 and compares Bradford’s performance against that of other local authorities.

 

Recommended-

 

That the Committee takes assurance from the result of the Local

Government and Social Care Ombudsman’s Annual Review of Local

Government Complaints 2017/18, that the Authority’s complaints

process is overall satisfactory.

 

                                                                        (Irina Arcas – 01274 435269)

 

 

Minutes:

The Assistant Director of the Chief Executive’s Office submitted Document “W” which summarised the number of complaints and investigations undertaken by the Ombudsman for the year ended 31 March 2018 and compared Bradford’s performance against that of other local authorities.

 

It was reported that the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman received a total of 123 new complaints and enquiries about Bradford between 1 April 2017 and 31 March 2018 compared to 120 in the previous year. A breakdown across services was detailed at 3.1.

 

Members were informed that upon receipt of a complaint the LGSCO would initially approach the Local Authority to ascertain the status of the complaint and would only accept complaints if the complainant had exhausted the Council’s own internal complaint process. 

 

It was reported that in 2017/18 the LGO made 130 decisions in relation to complaints about Bradford compared to 120 the previous year.  Of the 130 decisions made in 2017/18, 46 (35% compared to 51% in the previous year) were referred back to the Council for local resolution and 47 (36% compared to 22% in the previous year) were closed by the LGO after its initial enquiries. 7 (5%) complaints were considered incomplete, invalid or other advice was provided.  During the period in question 30 complaints (23 in 2016/17) were subject to a detailed investigation carried out by the LGSCO.  11 of those complaints were not upheld with 19 being upheld ie 15 % of the total complaints received by the LGO were upheld compared to 10 % in 2016/17.  A breakdown across service area of those subject to a formal investigation was set out at 3.3.

 

Members were informed that in terms of the percentage of upheld cases against the overall number of complaints the LGSCO received, Bradford (15%) ranked the second best against the West Yorkshire Comparators which averaged at 15%, and it was slightly higher than the national and the Yorkshire and Humber region averages, which were both 14%.

 

It was reported that the LGSCO had commented about Bradford Council’s positive approach to complaint handling, a prompt response to the Ombudsman’s enquiries and a positive response to the LGCSO’s decisions and recommendations.

 

Members were informed that the LGCSO published 40% more public interest reports during 2017/18, with a total of 42.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

It was reported that one of the 42 public reports was against Bradford Council in relation to a failure to refer a housing benefit applicant’s case on to the first tier tribunal.  In response the Authority had agreed with the Ombudsman that appeals in relation to benefits would be progressed within two months of receipt to the Tribunals subject to having received all the relevant information.  The Ombudsman agreed a target of 31 March 2018 to achieve that two month target which was met by the authority.  In addition to this the team had recently been the subject of an inspection by internal audit and received an excellent accreditation with regard to its current control processes.

 

In response to a Member’s question in relation to why there was a delay in referring housing benefits cases to the first tier tribunal it was reported that the service had a high case load similar to other authorities around changes to national legislation relating to benefit entitlement and it took time for interpretation and case law to be established; an implementation plan was put in place  and processes had been streamlined to ensure all cases were sent to tribunal within agreed  timelines.

 

Members were informed that the LGCSO Public report was presented to the Corporate Overview and Scrutiny Committee on the 21 February 2108.

 

In response to a Member’s question it was reported that the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman’s annual report next year would include whether the Ombudsman recommendations to each Council had been implemented and Councils would ensure that every recommendation was followed up.

 

The Chair queried why there had been a delay in completing the Council’s statutory investigation into a child protection case highlighted in the Ombudsman Letter, it was reported that this was due to someone leaving and finding someone else to allocate the case to but lessons had been learnt and a special monitoring system had been put in place, cases were now allocated to Managers much more quickly.  

 

Resolved-

 

That the Committee takes assurance from the result of the Local

Government and Social Care Ombudsman’s Annual Review of

Local Government Complaints 2017/18, that the Authority’s

complaints process is overall satisfactory.

 

                                                                       

Supporting documents: