Partnerships Lack Complaints Systems

Partnerships delivering services, such as children’s trusts, often lack effective procedures for service users who want to complain, according to research published this week.

A Local Government Ombudsman report, Local Partnerships and Citizen Redress, concluded partnerships frequently did not offer “information about how to register a complaint” and lacked “any formalised process for handling complaints”. It added there was often “confusion among staff and public about responsibilities and process”.

The report said complaint handling and redress needed to be “central in the governance of partnerships” and recommended local authorities establish rigorous and accessible complaint-handling arrangements. While there was “no experience” of complaints concerning children’s trusts, the report concluded that the “experience of health and social care partnerships in the areas of governance, complaint handling and operating pooled budget arrangements will no doubt be helpful in informing the practice of children’s trusts”.

The report also said there should be a clear statement about who is responsible for handling complaints and providing redress, as well as a “commitment to learning from complaints”, so services could be improved.

John Coughlan, joint president of the Association of Directors of Children’s Services, said partnerships needed to “make it clear, at the point of delivery, how people can complain”. But he added that different complaints procedures often caused conflicts that were difficult to resolve: “Children’s services departments are trying to find ways to marry children’s social services complaints mechanisms with education’s.”