77 complaints and enquiries made about Shropshire Council to Local Ombudsman last year

The Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman is responsible for investigating wrongdoing in local public services.

If it finds that the council has acted in an unfair or unjust way, the ombudsman will offer recommendations on how to make things right.

According to figures from the national body, there were 77 complaints or enquiries made about Shropshire Council in the year to March – up from 50 the year before.

After investigation, the ombudsman found the council to have acted unjustly on eight occasions last year.

The most common reason for coming to the ombudsman in Shropshire was for issues related to planning and development, with 20 complaints or enquiries.

This was closely followed by issues regarding adult social care, of which 14 complaints or enquiries were received by the ombudsman.

But only one notice was received about housing issues and three in regards to environmental services, public protection and regulation.

Nationally, the number of complaints rose compared to last year, with 15,826 in the year to March, up 25 per cent from 11,830 last year, but did not quite reach the 17,019 recorded in 2019 to 20.

Problems with education and children's services were the most common reason to get in touch with the organisation, with 3,145 complaints and enquiries, while there were more than 2,000 each for planning and development, adult social care, and housing.

Healthwatch England, a health and social care champion, said they were particularly concerned about the national rise in complaints about adult social care, suggesting that financial pressures may be to blame.

Jacob Lant, the charity's head of policy, said: “At the heart of every one of these complaints is someone who relies on social care to help them live their lives.

"And by speaking up these people and their carers have tried to send a message about how services are not meeting their needs."

In a letter to council chief executive Andy Begley in August, local ombudsman Michael King said that he was not impressed with Shropshire Council's performance in 2021 to 2022.

Mr King said that delays in resolving problems only add to people's distress and urged the council to "reflect on its practices" and take the "necessary steps to improve its liaison" with Mr King's office.

Shropshire Council told the Shropshire Star that it was not always possible to deal with ombudsman requests for information within 28 days.

It said its priority when it comes to deciding what to do will remain the delivery of services to residents.

Tim Collard, the council's assistant director – legal and governance (monitoring officer) said: "Shropshire Council deals with a large number of enquiries from the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman every year.

"These range from straightforward requests for more information about a complaint to detailed investigations which require extensive research and collation of considerable volumes of information.

"Generally the council is given 28 days by the ombudsman to respond to an investigation, whether the issue is current and on-going or it is an historical complaint with no immediate implications.

"Unfortunately it is not always possible to comply with these timescales given that service areas within the council need to deal with these ombudsman’s enquiries on top of their day to day responsibilities to the public and local communities.

"Where we need additional time we liaise with the investigator to seek an extension in which to respond, but even then it can sometimes prove challenging for any number of reasons including complexity of the issues, the volume of documentation involved and key staff sickness.

"As reported by the ombudsman, in the period from April 2021 to March 2022, there were three occasions in which there was a threat made to issue a witness summons.

"The three cases arose from across the council in children’s services, adult social care, and planning, and it is perhaps worth noting that in two of the cases the ombudsman ultimately found no fault on the part of the council.

"We accept that this was unfortunate but at the same time in all three cases, the council had by time of the threats, almost completed its work, preparing detailed responses and collating the many hundreds of pages of supporting documentation, so that it was never a real risk that a witness summons would actually have to be issued.

"Whilst the council is considering ways to improve its response times to ombudsman enquiries, its priority will always remain delivering services to Shropshire residents.”