Are you ready to push water uphill, or to count the star's in the sky?

That is akin to what you are going to take on and possibly more productive.....

Each department has its own procedure and I will generalise as much as possible but many elements remian the same throughout the UK

Complaint's eh?, Who needs 'em?

Well social services don't and that's a fact, in fact it would be seen that complaints are viewed in anything other than they way they should be dealt with and beware them for they will retalliate.

Because complaints will lose them Brownie points, staff, credibility and of course if theres too much, the higher echelons their jobs and plump pay packets. Also there is an element that they have the governments full backing when it comes to eroding your rights and they feel no one can make them if they don't want to.

There are three levels to complaints procedures but I will concern only with the first two levels as usually the LGO Ombudsman will take on the third and that is unknown territory to me, which is surprising as its two years nearly when an issue must be resolved within 6 weeks.

Your first port of call would be try to resolve issues directly, be polite and firm and make concessions if they would earn you your desired goal, it is worth working at geting it peacefully sorted as any steps after that will be viewed as malicious and boy do they react....

If you find you cannot resolve amicably, then talk to the team manager, explain your issues and tell them that you are thinking of making a complaint if those issues aren't resolved to a level of satisfaction. Do it in a way that is non-abusive and non aggressive, in my case I got labelled as being "mentally ill" because of the ferocity of my complaints but I will discuss this elsewhere.

If all goes badly or the issues do not resolve you have two choices, either bite the bullet and try and work things out or make a complaint formally to the Head of Social Services.

Get your departments leaflet on making a complaint, read it and take on board relevant details but remember they don't want you to complain so sometimes they "forget" to include stuff

Write you complaint in clear, non aggressive, non threatening prose, list as much detail as possible and include dates, times, witnesses and any pertinant detail you can muster, explain why you are complaining, why you feel so angry about your treatment and what you would like to happen to resolve this matter to YOUR satisfaction.

Keep a copy of this and any further remittances or replies.

You will get a bland letter telling you your complaint has been acknowledged etc , keep this and wait for a response.

Now what indicates a good or bad department is their first response after acknowledgement if:

1. The department Agrees with you and has dealt with this issue in house and promise that a further breach will not happen then you have a good department and they should honour their word, accept this reserving judgement if it should happen again etc but basically its up to you whether you wish to pursue it. I have had extensive dealings with Local Govt and I find that if they have made a reasonable effort and is rejected out of hand then they will endeavour not to help you further.
2. The department Disagrees with you and basically tells you that you are talking out of a rearward orifice, well know this now, you have problems because this is a hardass dept who will never accept anything unless its from the LGO Ombudsman or the courts themselves, even then I know of people who have continued to be persecuted after a court ruling dismissing them and injunctng them too, so beware as this is going to get messy.

Your Senior manager is up there in the clouds and usually has no real idea of what goes on in his satellite offices, so he calls the team manager in and demands "what's going on?", how many team managers are going to openly criticise their underlings when they know the SM will take their side so the TM will turn around and drop you in it, "theres nothing going on", "its a malicious complaint", "this person is lying to get my staff into trouble..", well you get the picture, don't you?

Now old Mr SM is faced with this situation, he has a colleague who has some very powerful Unison firends, he has you, now his preconceived view is also at play as like all people, he cannot conceive someone havng a social worker not being some sort of a deviant, he cannot see past the idea that you are getting it in the neck and his staff are anything other than glowing examples of sainthood, pure as the driven snow....

His response is hardassed and designed to tell you to go away as quick as possible and drop the complaints, it may contain menace in the response but its theme will be negative.

Now by this time the team manager has returned to his office, called in so and so the social worker and discussed the complaint, you the complainant and how to resolve this from their end. It will be seen in some instances that the TM will conspire to cover up any malpractices and make sure the rest of the staff there will back up the worker in the future.

That worker will want revenge more likely or not as no-one likes being criticised but this will cloud her perception and her view of you has stopped being fair whatsoever and she will not be able to interact with you objectively.

Having support from her TM and SM's, she will start to portray you as someone else, her view will deteriorate further and of course the TM and SM will see that she was "right" because she has found all this horrible stuff about you, the abusive parent.

My advice is to garner as much support as possible, utilise your MP, councillor, anyone that can help you get through this next rather tricky stage because like it or not, you are at war with the department.

A lesson to be learned from my own experience is to remain focused, the Local Authority used their tactics to rile me up and they did succed, I launched complaint after complaint to all in public office and of course the LA were sitting there saying I was mentally disturbed etc and of course the various "high-up" in govt office would believe one of them over me.

They will start all sorts of things against you in an attempt to get you to drop the complsint, they may even say that you did drop the complaint as they did in my case which was rubbish but the LGO Ombudsman bought it at first, remember your child is at risk so for gods sake do not allow any thing that may give them ammunition or to justify their cause.

If you still do not get anywhere, ask the LGO Ombudsman to intervene, send them your evidence if asked and make a statement to them, social services by this time will be nigh on apoplectic and you may wish you had not started it in the first place, also this is the danger zone for care proceedings being initiated, or risk registeration started, they deny it but I have been a victim of this "play by our rules or lose your kid" regime.

Record everything on paper, get witnesses to attend you because social services will bring a new tool into play, the attended worker or "doubling", the reason this is to have a clerk or another worker present when they speak to you, this is supposed to safeguard both sides but I also have had the experience where the clerk or other junior member will say what they are told to say, possibly in return for promotion or extra leave and pay.

Make sure you or your child is never alone with them, this is a legal right and a very serious issue, I made the mistake of trusting them and boy did they come out fighting and I remain convinced today that they used very poor tactics into tricking my daughter into making a false allegation about her stepmother.

Some suggestions of attainable goals for complaints:

• Letter of apology
• Letter vindicating your position
• Retraction of all erroneous information or at the very least marked as "opinion only"
• Disciplinary action against workers
• Compensation

Not all authorities will entertain the above but I do know of people who have attained such things, compensation is usually paid out of hand in cases where it is obvious a local authority would lose in court, disciplinary actions also have to be severe for the authority to risk antagonising Unison who will predictably defend the worker out of hand.

For advice please use the Forum or contact page for confidential advice

RPSSUK