The report of the Assistant Chief Executive and the City Solicitor is attached.

The Committee received its annual report from the Assistant Chief Executive and the City Solicitor setting out the Council’s annual performance for 2022/23 in the management of corporate and social care complaints, Councillor and MP enquiries, and information requests.

The Assistant Chief Executive reported an increase in the number of complaints in comparison to the previous year. He reportedpositive progress during 2022/23 to respond to more complaints and enquiries in a timely manner, despite significant increases in the overall numbers of complaints and enquiries that had been received. The timeliness of responses was reported as having markedly improved overall during 2022/23 and whilst some targets still had not been met, overall performance was much closer to the target than in previous years. This was in spite of significant challenges in terms of increased numbers of complaints and capacity. A key factor had been the embedding of the Council’s complaints handling system during the year.

The key points for consideration were summarised as:

·       An increase in the total number of stage one complaints from 3,157 in 2021/22 to 3,515 in 2022/23. These numbers are significantly higher than previous years. The proportion responded to in 10 days had improved from 77% to 81%.

·       The number of Stage 2 complaints (approximately 15%) had remained steady and had reportedly been responded to in a much more timely manner.

·       85 Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman (Ombudsman) enquiries compared to 81 in 2021/22 and much lower numbers in previous years, with a slight reduction in cases upheld. Performance in dealing with the Housing Ombudsman was highlighted as an area for as this is a new area of reporting for the Council.

·       An increase in Councillor / MP enquiries from 1,835 to 2,007 overall – noting the work undertaken to improve reporting of cases following discussion at Audit Committee last year – and an improvement in timeliness of response from 76% to 84%.

·       A significant reduction in the number of social care cases from 377 to 262, and an improvement in the proportion responded to in 20 days from 59% to 84%.

·       Both General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and Freedom of Information (FOI) request numbers remained largely steady.

·       There had been over 300 instances of praise across the Council

Learning Action Points were also appended to the report in line with a previous recommendation by this Committee.

There was a discussion about the established route for councillor and MP inquiries to ensure that they are not inadvertently underreported. The Complaints Manager referred to recently circulated guidance to members on the correct process. Where an element of dissatisfaction was detected in a given inquiry, as opposed to a routine request for service, there was an expectation that officers would record the matter on the councils complaints handling system to enable appropriate reporting. In response to a request from a member of the committee, the Complaints Manager agreed to explore the extent to which the complaints handling system was able to extract the number of complaints that had been recorded by the service involved.

In response to a comment about the steady rise in complaints in relation to children and education services over the last two years, the Committee was advised that these were predominantly in relation to dissatisfaction with school admissions processes, school access sufficiency, special educational needs and school transport access. Children's social care complaints however had reduced significantly. Discussion then moved to the extent to which complaints were associated with a recent policy change and/or budget restrictions. The Assistant Chief Executive agreed to explore the extent to which this could be reported on in future.

There was a discussion about the trend in Local Government Ombudsman referrals. A step change was described in relation to the growth in the number of cases over the last two years and the Assistant Chief Executive described the process for the management of Ombudsman cases as robust and effective and which ensured effective learning points for the service area involved. In respect of Housing Ombudsman cases (where emphasis was given that this had been reported separately this year).  He described a significant pressure that was linked with a government-led campaign to sign post social housing tenants where concerns lay in respect of housing quality. It was therefore anticipated that this trend would likely continue and the Complaints team would continue to work with services to ensure that those Ombudsman cases were appropriately managed. The Committee acknowledged the influence of targeted raising awareness campaigns and the association with long term behaviour change amongst residents. They noted the Assistant Chief Executive’s comments around the positive role of residents’ feedback on service development and policy change.

The Chair suggested, in terms of possible next steps, that consideration should be given to the involvement of the Members Development Group to underpin guidance for councillors on the established route for complaints  and which includes information on the nuance between service requests, complaints and the role of partners.  It was also suggested that a session on this could be targeted to newly appointed Councillors as part of the Member Induction programme.

The Executive Member for Finance thanked officers for the detailed report and highlighted the impact of staffing pressures that had arisen from significantly reduced local government funding since 2010 coupled with the impact of a growing city resulting in additional demand for services. He also referred to ICT infrastructural changes that were soon to be implemented which would promote the use of user-friendly platforms to enable residents with greater ease of access to services.

Decision

To note the report.