Failing social care system reflected in upheld complaints

The Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman’s latest annual review of complaints has shown that the service found fault in 72 per cent of the complaints it investigated last year.

This percentage of upheld cases is greater than the previous year (69 per cent) and shows a relentless rise over the last decade in the proportion of cases in which care users and their families have been let down by local services.

Michael King, Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman, said that the faults are often not due to one-off errors caused by staff working under pressure, but are increasingly caused by the measures employed by councils and care providers to mitigate the squeeze on their resources.

He said: “Viewed through the lens of complaints from the public, and our impartial findings, the adult social care system is progressively failing to deliver for those who need it mostIncreasingly it is a system where exceptional and sometimes unorthodox measures are being deployed simply to balance the books – a reality we see frequently pleaded in their defence by the councils and care providers we investigate.

“At a time of such pressure, it is now more important than ever to listen to public concerns in the form of complaints: they provide free intelligence to spot problems and drive improvement. Following on from the recent government announcement, I hope this report and the evidence it contains can help contribute to the debate about what a more sustainable care system will look like in the future.”