03/28/2024

Wales News Online

Local & National News for Wales

THE NUMBER of complaints about Pembrokeshire’s social services has increased in the last year.

A report to Monday’s (September 9) cabinet meeting states that social service complaints – both adult and children services – have increased from 58 in 2017/18 to 90 in 2018/19.

The number of compliments received about the service was 81.

A report to cabinet shows that the area with the highest complaints was the children in need team with 11, resolved locally, but the service also received eight compliments.

The adult service managed care teams, north and south, had 16 local resolved complaints and two requiring formal investigation, along with three compliments.

Cabinet member for social services Cllr Tessa Hodgson added that there had been a reduction in the number of complaints that progress to a formal investigation – from nine in 2017 to three in 2018/19.

There was a total of 31 complaints about children’s services, with one formal investigation in the family placement team and 59 adult service complaints, with two formal investigations.

She said the number of complaints made to the Public Services Ombudsman for Wales about social services had also dropped from 13 to seven during the same time period.

General local authority complaints to the Ombudsman had risen 794 to 912 in 2018/19 the cabinet report states with “the majority are satisfactorily resolved at an early stage.”

Cllr Hodgson said she had been “assured there’s no particular pattern to these complaints but they do reflect pressure on the service, particularly in adult care.”

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