Welcome to News from the Ombudsman, bringing you the latest information, news and views from the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman.

View online News from the Ombudsman - Summer 2021 Welcome... Welcome to the latest edition of News from the Ombudsman.  In this edition you can read about our annual review of complaints, how you can easily look at the complaints we've investigated about your local council and about how we've made our website more accessible for people with visual impairments. You can also read about how we're using the learning from your complaints to inform government policy-making.  We hope you enjoy reading our newsletter. If you'd like to hear more about the work we do, why not follow us on Twitter or LinkedIn? Annual review launched Last week we launched our Annual Review of Local Government Complaints. Now in its seventh year, our annual review details all the headline figures from the past year's complaints.  The report shows in 2020-21 we upheld a greater proportion of our investigations (67%) than ever before. This continues an upward trend since we started publishing our uphold rate (it was only 46% in 2013-14). Despite being closed to new complaints at the height of the first lockdown, and so registering fewer complaints than recent years, we still received 11,830 complaints and enquiries. Those investigations have led to 3,104 recommendations to put things right for individuals. More importantly, there were 1,488 recommendations for councils to improve their services for others – such as revising procedures and training staff.  Later in the year we'll be publishing our annual review of adult social care complaints, which includes the complaints we investigate about independent care providers. Read more Mapping out where things have improved (or not!) Our innovative Your Council's Performance map has just received a fresh batch of data. You can now see how your council performed last year (April 2020 – March 2021). Did they embrace our investigations in the right way, by implementing each one of our recommendations? Did they agree to carry out many more service improvements – like reviewing policies and procedures or updating the information on their website? Were there any cases in which we credited the council for suggesting the right way to resolve the problem before it came to us? You can find this out and more by looking for your council on our map. With three years of information now available you can start to build a picture of how things have gone over time, and how they stand against average rates for similar type councils. For those interested in scrutinising the data, we would recommend looking particularly at the uphold rate (the proportion of complaints where we found something went wrong); the compliance rate (non-compliance is rare and we would look closely at any council with less than 100%); and our annual review letters to councils to see if we welcomed any positive actions or highlighted areas to improve. Remember that complaints information should form part of a picture, balanced with other external factors, but can be an insight into the corporate culture of an organisation. Bear in mind the impact of the pandemic last year meant we generally received and decided fewer complaints across the board – so take this into account when comparing last year's information with previous years.   Search the map Step into our new look website You might have recently noticed a change to the look of our website. We made some changes to improve the experience for people wanting to make a complaint to us, and for those with disabilities who access websites differently to others. One of the big improvements is a new page that breaks down – in a step-by-step process – the best way to get your issue resolved. It aims to make the steps you should take, before you complain to us, more visible – and explain more clearly what will happen after you have registered a complaint. We have also made some general improvements to ensure our website works as well as possible for people who use websites in a different way to most. This includes those who need assistive technologies, like screen readers, or cannot use a mouse. For example, we have changed some colours to improve contrast levels to help people with sight disabilities, we have made the website easier to use when zoomed in to make the font very large, and it is more convenient to browse and control the site when using only a keyboard. You can find out more about the accessibility of our website by reading our accessibility statement. Visit the site Our submissions We use the evidence we gain from our work to respond to Government consultations and input into inquiries. The Equalities and Human Rights Commission has launched an inquiry into challenging decisions about social care. The inquiry will attempt to understand people's experiences of challenging, or trying to challenge, local council decisions about adult social care or support. We will be submitting our evidence and views to this inquiry in due course. We also responded to the Government's consultation on the National Planning Policy Framework and National Model Design Code. You can read our response to this consultation here and the government's response online. News you may have missed Council to look again at summer-born children's school start date requests Disabled boy missed out on education and support because of poor council practice Ombudsman raps council for taking too long to change care home charging policy City of Wolverhampton Council to improve its adoption recruitment process Camden's poor complaint response prompts further Ombudsman investigation Birmingham to review school transport for children and young people following Ombudsman investigation Ombudsman finds London council failed to keep child safe Essex County Council to reconsider assessment of Disability Related Expenses Redbridge council continues to fail man with severe learning disability Family foster carers could be due backdated payments following Ombudsman investigation Isle of Wight Council removes health care support for boy with medical needs We look at individual complaints about local public services and all registerable social care providers in England. We remedy injustice and share learning from investigations to improve services. When we find a council or care provider has done something wrong, we recommend how it should put it right. We are free to use and make our decisions independently. Find out more about us at www.lgo.org.uk Manage preferences or unsubscribe Contact us

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