Ombudsman faults Hackney over disabled man’s care delays

Hackney Council has shelled out £2,500 to a disabled man and his family after its failures caused delays in moving him into supported living.

The man, known only as Mr X, is non-verbal and his learning disabilities make him unable to make key decisions for himself. His sister, Miss X, emailed the council in late August 2024 about moving him from the day centre he had been attending three days a week for several years, but where he was no longer making progress.

The family wanted to support him into more independent living, and by late September Miss X had asked the council to allocate a social worker to reassess his needs and to consider whether he was eligible for a supported living placement.

By mid-November 2024 the council had recognised there was an urgent need to act, since Miss X and their mother, Mrs X, were left caring for him to the point that they were on the verge of a “breakdown”.

It did not allocate a social worker until late January 2025, and approved a permanent supported living placement for him the following month.

But the man would not be moved until February 2026, 18 months after his sister’s first email. The Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman found that during this time the council made a number of errors and decisions, creating delays that caused the family injustice.

The watchdog noted that the crisis had forced Miss X to put her own life on hold so she could care and advocate for her brother.

That finding came from a carer’s assessment the council did not complete until May 2025. Mrs X’s own assessment had been carried out in February. Both should have been done in November 2024, the month the council’s internal review warned that the carers were at risk of breaking down, and the ombudsman found the delay beyond that point was fault.

The two assessments granted each of the women a one-off direct payment for a spa day, and raised Mr X’s respite entitlement from 14 to 28 days a year — support the watchdog found no fault with in itself, only in how late it arrived.

Even though the council was dealing with a shortage of vacancies for supported living arrangements, the ombudsman concluded that it could have and should have dealt with the case sooner.

The council took several months to review Mr X’s circumstances. The council itself accepted that it had delayed significantly in reviewing his care between 2019 and 2025, a period the ombudsman did not examine because the investigation covered only the year from August 2024. Statutory guidance says care and support plans should be reviewed at least every 12 months.

Payment refused

The watchdog also blasted the council for refusing to directly pay for Mr X to employ his mother as his personal assistant to provide care, only to reverse this decision later. The law states that these types of arrangements are allowed where “strictly necessary”. When the council rejected this request at first, officers cited his mother’s health and the availability of care outside his home.

Amid the struggle to find a suitable new placement, the council arranged a week-long respite stay in another local authority area in late February 2025.

That week passed without incident, and the council booked a second week with the same provider in late March. But when Mr X returned home, his family feared he had been neglected after discovering he had not been supported to shower or change his clothes during the placement. The unnamed hosting council then triggered a safeguarding inquiry into what went wrong.

Hackney also failed to produce evidence, when the watchdog asked for it, of the searches it had made for a placement. And rather than showing it had acted on the safeguarding inquiry’s recommendation to review whether the provider was suitable for non-verbal adults needing full support with personal care, it offered the ombudsman only general assurances about how it monitors care quality.

Mr X’s care and support plan was issued in February 2025, though the council mistakenly included his late father’s phone number as the primary care contact on his plan.

He was not moved into a supported living placement until February 2026.

Though the council struggled to find a vacancy and the family wanted to see the new home first-hand, Hackney “should have identified and contracted a suitable care provider much sooner,” the ombudsman concluded.

Compensation

The council had already offered the family £1,000 in compensation for the delays. But the watchdog asked the council to pay a further £500 to Mr X, his mother and his sister, bringing the total payout to £2,500.

The ombudsman said the family deserved an apology and a further symbolic payment because the council failed to establish the unique role only Mrs X could play in her son’s care, and to consider a direct payment, at the January 2025 reassessment.

It should also have given the idea due consideration when Miss X first raised it in November 2024, rather than simply rejecting it. Hackney has since agreed to explain how it vetted the suitability of the care provider, and to improve training for all assessment staff to prevent wrongful payment refusals happening again.

The Local Democracy Reporting Service (LDRS) contacted Hackney Council for comment, but the council did not reply in time for publication.