Potton Homes

Complaints & Representation

Relevant Legislation

Children’s Act 1989 Volume 5

Children’s Act 1989, Guidance & Regulations, Volume 4

Children’s Homes Regulations 2015

Quality standards for Children’s Homes

Related Procedures & Guidance

Safeguarding Children

Privacy and Confidentiality

Children’s Rights

Consultation with Children and Parents

Preserving Children’s Religious, Racial, Cultural, and Linguistic Heritage

Notifications of Significant Events

Role of the Key Worker

Local Authority Formal Complaints Procedure

Potton HomesComplaints Form

Potton Homes is an organisation that is committed to providing a nurturing and supportive environment in which children can thrive and grow.

Application of policy

This policy applies to all members of childcare practitioners and teaching staff, students and volunteers working in children’s homes within the organization.

Policy Statement

Potton Homes accepts that it is accountable to all children, young people, their families, parents and placing authorities for the quality of the services the organization provides. Accordingly, it respects the right of children, young people and parents, as well as their families to make representations and complaints.

The formal and informal procedures set out below have been put in place to help children, young people, and others to complain should they need. Potton Homes expects managers and childcare practitioners and teaching staff to deal professionally with all complaints in line with the procedures which include information about how to proceed if the complaint about the manager of the home. The company expressly forbids any attempt to prevent children; young people and their parents as well as families from making a complaint and ant such action will be dealt with under the organizations disciplinary procedure.

The organization works closely with the organization ‘Voice For the Child in Care’ to provide the children, young people, their families using its home with an independent advocacy service to assist in the process of making complaints and representation shouldthey require help to do so. Children, young people, their families have access to an independent advocacy service provided by the Children’s Society.

It is Potton Homes policy for there to be no restrictions on issues children, young people, their families and parents may complain about.

Potton Homes believes that wherever possible, complaints should be dealt with swiftly and informally (they must be always responded to within a maximum of 5 days in writing). It is usually far better for all concerned if dissatisfaction can be resolved as near to the point it arose as possible.

If a child, young person, parent or family member wishes to make a formal complaint however, or if they are not satisfied with the outcome of an investigation into their complaint using the Potton Homes informal procedure, then they have the right to access the complaints procedure of their placing local authority. They also have the right to complain directly to Potton Homes registered provider and the Regulating Body Ofsted .

Potton Homes procedures, informing children, young people and their parents and families about how to complain, formally and informally, has been set out in a simple, user-friendly leaflet. Information about how to complain is also included in the information for children and young people’s brochures produced by the organisation for each one of the homes and each home’s Statement of Purpose and Function. Every child, young person and if possible parents and families admitted to the homes must be given a copy of the leaflet and brochure upon arrival and the complaints procedure must be explained to them by their Keyworker. More generally copies of the complaints leaflet should also be routinely accessible to children, young people, their parent and families at all times.

In order to ensure that Potton Homes and the procedure is effectively translated into practice, the organization undertakes to provide childcare practitioners and teaching staff with regular training to enable them to deal appropriately with complaints in accordance with the contents of the policy and procedure.

Potton Homes also undertakes to monitor complaints and the outcomes of investigations into complaints in order to check the satisfactory operation of its complaints procedure, to identify patterns of complaints and to ensure appropriate investigative action and recording is taking place in connection with all complaints received. The registeredmanager will check each home’s complaints record every month with the independent visitor. An 6 monthly report listing all complaints, how they were handled and their outcomes will also be produced.

1 Introduction

1.1If a children’s homes day-to-day practice is consistent, open and fair, it is likely that the majority of problems that arise will be resolved quickly to everyone’s satisfaction without recourse to formal procedures.

1.2Children, young people and their parents and families should always be consulted about decisions effecting their involvement in general day to day running of the home should be encouraged. For example, resident’s meetings children and young people are accountable to their peers and the childcare practitioners and teaching staff for their conduct in the home. Childcare practitioners and teaching staff members are also accountable to the children, young people, their parents and families for the quality of the care provided. This should be reflected in residents meetings. Children and young people will use residents meetings positively if they believe action was going to be taken to address their concerns or any issues that they raise, or where this is not possible, reasoned explanations are given. Residents meetings should always be recorded, with decisions made and action to be taken clearly noted.

1.3Regular key work sessions with children and young people should be held the key worker, as co-coordinator of the child’s care in the home, is in a particularly good position to talk through with the child any problems or difficulties s/he may be experiencing. Decisions reached in these meetings must be clearly recorded any necessary action to be taken promptly.

1.4Childcare practitioners and teaching staff must be prepared to acknowledge that they will occasionally make mistakes and that a reconsideration of decisions previously taken may be necessary.

This should help create an environment in which problems can be quickly and effectively solved. (Please note however that individual childcare practitioners and teaching staff members should never act alone and reverse decisions without first consulting with the manager and other members of childcare practitioners and teaching staff team). This should preferably be done at thechildcare practitioners and teaching staff meeting.

1.5Most children, young people and their parents and families who wish to make a complaint will simply want it to be sorted out quickly and with a minimum of fuss. Some will not have the confidence, however, to pursue a complaint without support and they may want an independent advocate, social worker, parent or anther familiar adult to support or represent them. This wish should always be respectedand facilitated. All complaints verbal and written are to be dealt with using the procedure.

1.6Childcare practitioners and teaching staff should always be perceptive to a child or young person’s unhappiness caused by difficulties they are experiencing within the home some children will act out their unhappiness, dissatisfaction and anger. Whilst the acting out behaviour will need to be addressed, childcare practitioners and teaching staff should also look beyond the presenting behaviour and try to understand the root cause of the problem.

1.7Children and young people must always have access to a private telephone, help line should be prominently displayed incase they wish to make use of them. They should also have the opportunity, should they wish to do so, to talk to their parents or family, their social worker, Regulating Body Ofsted and the appointed independent advocate.

2Procedures

Formal or Informal Procedures/How to Decide?

2.1In reaching these decisions the child, young person, their parents or family or any other complainant’s wishes must always be respected. In most cases they will want their complaints to be dealt with quickly and possibly with the advice and support of the independent advocate or their social worker, they will be content for the matter to be first dealt with using the informal procedure set out in 3 below. If they wish to make a formal complaint however either using their placing local authority’s procedure or directly To Ofsted they should be helped to do so in accordance with procedure in paragraph 4.

2.2All complaints involving harm to children and young people must be dealt with formally in accordance with the procedure in paragraph 4 below and Potton Homes Safeguarding policy and procedure. Similarly, complaints concerning childcare practitioners and teaching staff misconduct likely to require investigation under the Potton Homeschildcare practitioners and teaching staff disciplinary procedure must be dealt with formally.

3How to deal with informal procedures.

3.1If a child, young person and family have a complaint and they are agreeable, at least in the first instance, for it to be dealt with informally, the following procedures should be used.

(a)The member of childcare practitioners and teaching staff on duty should make a written record of the complaint. It should be shown to and signed by the child, parent or complainant if possible. A brief record of the complaint should alsomade in the homes running log, the central complaints log and the child’s personal file.

(b)At the first available opportunity it should be shown to the manager. The manager should confirm based on the nature of the complaint to be handled informally (see paragraph 2.1 and 22 above) and if so, how and by whom it is to be investigated.

(c)If the homes manager is the subject of the complaint it should be referred promptly and directly to the responsible individualwho will decide how the complaint is to be handled. The registered person will then co-ordinate the handling of the complaint in accordance with the procedures below.

(d)The registered person/manager should meet with the child, and possible the parent or other complainant as quickly as possible, that the complaint is justified, and the member of childcare practitioners and teaching staff is prepared to apologise, it may be possible for the registered provider/manager simply to arrange a meeting between the member of childcare practitioners and teaching staff and the child, parent or other complainant to resolve the matter.

(e) If it is not that straightforward and an investigation is going to be necessary the manager should explain how s/he intends to proceed with the investigation. If the complainant is a child or young person, the registered person/manager should identify the child’s support needs during the investigation process and ensure they are put in place.

(f)The manager should inform, in writing, the child’s social worker about the complaint and how it is being handled

(g)If a childcare practitioners and teaching staff member is the subject of the complaint, only the manager or in the deputy manager if allocated responsibility should investigate the matter. The manager or deputy should meet with the childcare practitioners and teaching staff member concerned to explain how the investigation is to proceed. The manager should also consider the childcare practitioners and teaching staff members support needs during the investigation and ensure they are put in place.

(h)The manager or deputy should identify all those involved in the complaint, including witnesses of the incident, which gave rise to it and arrange interviews with them as soon as possible. A written record should be kept of each interview. The aim of the interviews should be to gather as much information as possible, this will help the manager or deputy, in consultation with the responsible person, to make an informed decision about whether or not to uphold the complaint and to decide what, if any action needs to be taken.

(i)The child, young person, their parents or family making the complaint, the subject of the complaint any others involved should be informed of the outcome both verbally and in writing by the manager or deputy as quickly as possible and within 14 days (acknowledgment in writing within 72 hours). A record of the investigation and the outcome should be placed in the central complaints book, on the child’s individual case records. The registered manager, the child’ssocial worker, the parents and where necessary the regulating body Ofsted, if the complaint falls into the Child Protection.

(j)If the complainant is not satisfied with the outcome s/he should be advised and helped to use the relevant placing local authority formal complaints procedure to purse the complaint further. Similarly, any child or young person who is the subject of a complaint and is unhappy with the outcome should be advised of his/her right to do the same. Childcare practitioners and teaching staff members who are the subject of complains, who are discontent with the outcome of the investigation, have the right to take the matter up through Potton Homeschildcare practitioners and teaching staffGrievance Procedure.

(k)The approach throughout the above procedure should be to resolve the problem that gave rise to the complaint to every ones satisfaction as thoroughly but as quickly as possible. Mangers should also remember that, for those involved in a complaint, it might be a worrying and stressful time. Extra support should be available to children and childcare practitioners and teaching staff involved in the process.

  1. How to Support Children, External Complaints their Parents and Families who wish to make a Formal Complaint

4.1Children, young people their parents or families who wish to make a formal complaint to their local authority or direct to Ofsted should always are given the necessary assistance to do so.

4.2The relevant placing local authority’s formal procedure should be available at the home for the child, young person, and parent or family and relevant professionals to use should they wish to do so (ensuring the availability of the procedure should be the responsibility of the manager). This will be readily accessible to all the above.

4.3Assistance to understand and use the procedure should be provided directly or coordinated by the manager or the deputy manager (unless in the cases where the manager or the deputy are the subject of the complaint in which case the assistance should be provided directly or coordinated by the registered provider and in consultation with the responsible person with external line management responsibility for the home.

4.4The assistance should always involve:

  • Helping them to access and understand the relevant local authority formal procedures and giving them advice on how to use it and or details of how they may contact the regulating body Ofsted direct if that is their wish.
  • Helping them to formulate their complaint and put it in writing
  • Contacting the placing authority social worker and designated complaints officer within the placing authority as well as Ofsted, stressing that the complainant wish’s for the complaint to be handled formally and contacting others in the child’s care network e.g. the parents or family to inform them of the complaint and how it is being handled.
  • Informing the registered person/manager for the home to pursue the complaint.
  • Providing support to the child, young person, their parents or family during the process of any ensuring investigation carried out under the local authority procedure.
  • Facilating the investigation process wherever possible including making necessary records available or ensuring childcare practitioners and teaching staff are available for interview as required.
  • Maintain regular liaisons with the placing authority social worker to ensure that the investigation into the complaint is progressing within the time scales specified in placing authority’s formal complaints procedure.

4.5All formal complaints and their outcomes must be fully recorded in the homes central complaints book, on the child’s personal file and the social worker, responsible person, parents or family.

4.6Where the complaint falls into Child Protection the regulating body Ofsted are also to be informed in writing.

4.7In the event of the child, young person, parent or family member wishing to appeal against the outcome of the formal placing local authority investigation into the complaint they should be assisted to understand and pursue the appeal part of the placing authority procedure, including receiving information about the timescales for appeal. The appeal and eventual outcome should be fully recorded in the homes central complaint book and on the young person’s personal file. All those specified above 4.4 should be notified of the appeal and the eventual outcome of the appeal.

Complaints policy and procedure
March 2015