Issue - meetings

That the report be noted. 

The Head of Development and Resources introduced a report to inform Members about the compliments, representations and complaints received by Social Services for Adults and Children for the year April 2011 to March 2012. 

                        He detailed the background to the report explaining that local authorities were required to maintain a representations and complaints procedure for social services functions and report annually to the Welsh Government (WG) on its operation of the procedure.  There were three stages to the procedure with stage 1 being considered at local level, stage 2 still being within the Council but independent of the original service manager and stage 3 which was the complaint being reported to WG.  The Head of Development and Resources explained that Heads of Service welcomed complaints to improve the service and added that far more compliments than complaints were received. 

                        The table on page 8 provided a breakdown of the 89 complaints received by Social Services for Adults.  The Head of Development and Resources indicated that 10 had progressed to stage 2 in 2011-12 which was an increase from four in 2010-11.  Details of the complaints were reported in paragraphs 3.3 to 3.32.  He detailed some of the wide variety of methods for putting complaints right and said that the timescale for actioning complaints was 10 days for those at stage 1 and 25 days for those which progressed to stage 2; all complaints had been completed within the appropriate timescale. 

                        Paragraph 3.33 to 3.48 provided details of the compliments which had been received by Social Services for Adults which totalled 213.  Complaints for Social Services for Children totalled 54 which was a slight increase on previous years but was also reflective of the increase in referrals to the service which had seen 821 for 2011-12 compared to 606 referrals for 2010-11; details were provided in paragraphs 3.49 to 3.59.  Of the complaints received, 70% were responded to within the 10 day timescale compared with 57% for 2010-11.  Social Services for Children recorded 69 compliments in the year 2011-12 from families and the Courts and an additional 15 compliments relating to the work contributions to the Youth Justice Service. 

                        The Head of Development and Resources explained that the Welsh Government (WG) had produced a consultation paper ‘Making Things Better’ which proposed changes to managing complaints about Social Services in Wales.  The proposals included the removal of Stage 3 (Independent Review Panel) and the role of the Care and Social Services Inspectorate for Wales (CSSIW) in dealing with complaints about residential homes and people who self-fund.  Officers had responded to the consultation paper and a further report would be submitted to Committee once WG had confirmed what the changes would be.

            Councillor M. Bateman expressed her thanks to the Homecare Service which she said had been excellent in her experience. 

            The Chair asked a question on behalf of Councillor H.J. McGuill on why there had been an increase in the cost of investigations for the year for Social Services for Adults from  ...  view the full minutes text for item 11