Agenda item

To present the report of the Head of Function (Council Business)/Monitoring Officer.

The report of the Director of Function (Council Business)/Monitoring Officer providing information on issues arising under the Council’s Concerns and Complaints Policy for the period 1 April, 2018 to 31 March, 2019 was presented for the Committee’s consideration. The report also included Social Services complaints but only those where the complainant was not a service user. Service user complaints are dealt with under the Social Services Representations and Complaints Procedure and are reported annually to the Corporate Scrutiny Committee.

The Director of Function (Council Business)/Monitoring Officer reported on the main points as follows –

•           During the period covered by the report, 62 concerns were received and 76 complaints were made. Of the 76 complaints, one (Housing) remains open as the required works have not been completed and another (Planning) is on hold as the Council is waiting to hear from the Public Services Ombudsman for Wales (PSOW). Therefore, 74 complaints have been investigated and responded to during this period. The number of complaints received remains at around the same level as in 2017/18.

•           Of the 74 complaints dealt with during the period, 16 were upheld in full, 7 were partly upheld and 51 were not upheld.9 complaints were escalated to the PSOW, 5 were rejected by the PSOW and 4 complaints (Resources) were resolved by early resolution. Each of the 9 complaints escalated to the PSOW had been through the internal process. A breakdown of the concerns and complaints by service is provided in the report.

•           The overall rate of responses to complaints issued within the specified time limit (20 working days) was 92.6%. 9% of the complaints received (up from 5% in 2017/18) resulted from escalated concerns which continues to indicate that services are dealing effectively with concerns thereby limiting formal complaints.

•           The Concerns and Complaints Policy places an emphasis on learning lessons from complaints and thereby improving services. Enclosure 1 to the report explains what lessons have been learnt and any practice which has evolved as a consequence of these findings.

•           Where the complainant remains dissatisfied with the Council’s response to a complaint, the Concerns and Complaints Policy includes the option of escalating the complaint to the PSOW. There were 18 complaints relevant to this process within the timescale of the report lodged with the PSOW – only 1 was considered sufficiently serious to warrant an investigation; this was a Highways matter which was dealt with by way of the Council agreeing to an early voluntary resolution.

•           During 2018/19, 1 code of conduct complaint was received by the PSOW against a County Councillor but was closed after initial assessment. There were no investigations against County Councillors.

•           Whilst there were no formal language related complaints during the year, 4 expressions of concern were received and recorded relating to the matters documented in the report. All 4 issues were resolved without being escalated into formal complaints.

•           During 2018/19, 1 whistleblowing concern under the Council’s Whistleblowing Policy was received and is noted in the report.

It was resolved –

•           To accept the report as providing reasonable assurance that the Council is compliant with the processes required under its Concerns and Complaints Policy and Whistleblowing Policy/Guidance.

•           To accept and to note the Lessons Learnt Table as at Enclosure 1 to the report.

NO ADDITIONAL ACTION WAS PROPOSED