Lincolnshire County Council has been ordered to pay the mother of a disabled child £150 after it failed to properly investigate a complaint she made.
The Local Government Ombudsman said the council had not handled Mrs X’s complaint correctly which it said “caused Mrs X uncertainty about what the outcome of her complaint would have been had the council considered it properly”.
According to the LGO’s report, the mother complained about her son’s assessment in September 2021 including making reports around “non-delivery of social care support and a delay in decision making and provision of service”.
LCC responded initially, however Mrs X was “dissatisfied” with the response and escalated her complaint.
“It told her she had reached the end of the council’s complaint process and directed her to us if she remained dissatisfied with its response. Mrs X complained to us,” said the LGO report.
It found: “Y is a child in need as a result of his disabilities. Mrs X’s complaint to the council was about matters which the law is clear it should reply to using the statutory children’s complaints procedure.
“Not doing so was fault and meant the council did not handle Mrs X’s complaint correctly.
“This caused Mrs X uncertainty about what the outcome of her complaint would have been had the council considered it properly.”
The inspector told LCC to start a stage two investigation into Mrs X’s complaint, to apologise to the mother and to pay her £150 to “acknowledge the avoidable uncertainty and time and trouble caused to her by failing to investigate her complaint”.
The LGO, however, would not investigate the complaint itself at this stage because the council itself had, at the time of the report, not properly considered them itself.
“If Mrs X remains unhappy at the conclusion of the children’s statutory complaints procedure she can, within 12 months of the council’s final response, complain again to us,” said the inspector.
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Nominations are open for schools and education settings to be recognised in the 2022 Lincolnshire Education Excellence Awards.
The event is organised by Stonebow Media, publishers of The Lincolnite, to celebrate the best school and teachers in Greater Lincolnshire.
The headline sponsors making the awards possible are Lincoln College Group.
Twelve categories are now open for nominations. The deadline for nominations is June 3, with a judging lunch scheduled for June 7.
Nominations are open from parents, carers, friends, families or education settings themselves, so if you know someone who deserving of winning now is the time to vote!
The awards ceremony will be held at the Engine Shed on July 7.
It’s been a week since the controversial statue of Margaret Thatcher was installed in Grantham’s St Peter’s Hill.
The £300,000 bronze monument immediately caused a stir and debate from both supporters and opponents of the first female Prime Minister of the UK.
Within hours of its 7am installation last Sunday, it had already been egged by a man later revealed to be 59-year-old Jeremy Webster, a deputy director at the Attenborough Arts Centre at the University of Leicester.
Mr Webster’s mother-in-law recently described his actions as “childish”.
Quoted in the MailOnline she said: “Margaret Thatcher lasted a long time in power. She was a trailblazer as the first woman prime minister and she had such energy, even though I know she slept very little.
“I’m very surprised to hear about all of this [egg throwing]. I’m going to have to call my daughter. I wouldn’t have thought Jeremy would be the sort of person to do this. It seems very childish to me – he has a responsible job.”
There have been reports of other antisocial behaviour taking place including people urinating up the statue, but investigations into these are yet to be confirmed by officials.
Away from the statue itself, others took to social media to react to the new monument.
Twitterer @BolsoverBeast thought Mr Webster’s actions should be expanded as a way to… get more people involved?
I think it would be a good idea to put Thatcher’s statue on a low loader and tow it slowly around the country so that we all have a chance to throw something at it. pic.twitter.com/uftMqr0LgR
— Chloe Schlosberg (@ChloeSchlosberg) May 19, 2022
Some called back to the fate of other statues
@Irritatedllama called back to the fate of slave trader Edward Colston who was thrown into the Bristol Harby in June 2020.
It's absolutely disgraceful that people are throwing eggs at the Margaret Thatcher statue in Grantham! We need to deploy a taskforce to give it jolly good wash!#Granthampic.twitter.com/RKftKUls4u
It wasn’t long before a parody account of the statue was set up on Twitter – nor before “she” was interacting with other parody accounts.
It was awful. I could see almost all of Grantham
— That Statue of Thatcher (@thatcher_statue) May 18, 2022
A… positive view?
There were supporters of the statue, however, Darren Grimes from GBNews was one of the few popular posts calling on people not to “give in to threats of petty vandalism”. He later posted the statue should be in parliament – where it was previously rejected from.
I honestly think Margaret Thatcher would have found this first round of petty vandalism of her statue to be utterly hilarious.
The statue looks absolutely glorious.
Almost a decade on from her passing, she’s still winding them up!
Some, like @Jonnyhibberd were more measured in their response.
I don't see a problem with a Thatcher statue and I also don't see a problem with people throwing eggs at it. Thatcher is an important part of our history, and so is what a lot of people thought about her.
— Jonathan Hibberd 🇺🇦 (@Jonnyhibberd) May 18, 2022
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