Ombudsman annual report reveals two-thirds of complaints upheld after detailed investigation

The Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman has published its ‘Annual Report and Accounts 2021-22’, which highlights improvements for complainants and local service users.

The report notes that one of the key areas of focus last year (1 April 2021 – 31 March 2022), was on improving waiting times at the early part of its investigation process.

The report revealed that the Ombudsman significantly increased the number of initial investigations it made within 20 working days (which is the process of deciding whether it can and should investigate someone’s complaint in more detail).

It was revealed that the Ombudsman “more than halved” the number of cases where people were waiting for their complaint to be allocated to an investigator.

Additionally, the report revealed that the Ombudsman “continued to perform well against its longer time targets”, completing 77% of all complaints within three months and 84% within six months.

Following recommendations from the Ombudsman, the report revealed that councils and care providers agreed to 1,967 of recommendations targeted at improving their services.

The report said service improvement recommendations typically comprise of actions such as: changing policies and procedures, reviewing other people’s cases for potential injustice, training staff and enhancing public information about services. 

Of the 17,534 cases the Ombudsman decided, 6,607 were dealt with by an initial investigation. The Ombudsman dealt with 4,253 cases through a detailed investigation, of which it upheld 66% (2,825 in number), the report revealed.

Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman, Michael King, said: “I’m very pleased we made great strides in improving the speed of our initial investigations last year.

“The quicker we decide whether we can or should look into someone’s complaint, the quicker people have certainty about their situation.

“The plan we introduced, to get our casework onto a sustainable footing, means we can focus on reducing waiting times in the short term, but not at the cost of equally important work to share the learning from our investigations. A fantastic example of how important this work continues to be is the Focus Report we published on Covid-19, which I’m hugely proud of."

Mr King added: “As always, credit must go to our biggest asset – our staff – for their efforts in ensuring we continued to provide an excellent service for the public last year.”

Last year, the Ombudsman also launched its three-yearly policy vision on how its legislative role might “develop and change to help remedy injustice for people currently unable to access redress”.

Lottie Winson