Can I request minutes of social care meeting as Local Authority are trying to evade paying previously agreed allowance.

[CY23]

Hi everyone,
I looked after my godson under an interim CAO until September 2023 where I became his Special Guardian. Whilst being assessed for a SGO I was financially assessed by the Connected Persons team and a figure of £202.06 was calculated. Unfortunately this was not calculated on the correct information on these two points 1) it had been previously agreed twice at panel that I could receive the full allowance and no deductions for Child benefit or child tax credit made as I am on income based ESA. 2) My LA have an unlawful policy as they have two different rates- £223.86 for Kinship Carers and £230.58 for foster carers. I have had to get these two points rectified, which they have been now in time to finalise the SGO. However, I asked my child’s social workers team to assess me for financial support and at first they refused but then the connected persons social worker had a meeting with the Children's services side and it was agreed that I would receive the same allowance that I would get under SGO and that they would pay that until the SGO was finalised. This was because it was delayed and took three years to conclude. The problem is that when they started to pay the allowance they took the figure from the connected persons financial assessments and paid £202.06 which deducted the child benefit and was calculated at the incorrect kinship rate. When I told them that it all had to be sorted out as it was incorrect they said that is fine, if there is anything owing then it will be backdated. The children’s services team only started to pay the correct allowance on July 11 2023. This was the full SGO allowance equal to the fostering rate with no deductions. They paid this every week until the SGO was finalised in 22 September 2023 when it transferred to the connected persons team who pay the full allowance no deductions. However, I did not receive any of the backdated correct allowance back to November 2022. I have written to ask them for this and they have done a 360 turn and completely changed the narrative. They are saying that they deduct the child benefit and they cannot duplicate it. When I said but it has been agreed that it won’t be deducted because I am in income based benefits, they said that’s when the SGO starts, not before. This is a different narrative to what they agreed to pay- the SGO allowance. I think they have changed this to evade paying backdated allowance. It really doesn’t make sense and I don’t think they quite understand as they are saying they will need to deduct child benefit from November 2022 to 4 July 2023 but then they have paid the full allowance with no deductions from 11 July 2023 to 22 September 2023. They also said we didn’t know you were getting child benefit, which they did because it was in my financial assessment, I had an in-depth conversation with my child’s social worker about all the incorrect calculations where I told her we received it. She had brought the cash of the 12 weeks backdated Child benefit to give me but I didn’t accept it as I said that I wanted to sort it all out first. She took it away and said that it could be backdated when it was all sorted out. Now they have said we didn’t know you were receiving child benefit so that’s why we said that but now we are deducting it. I had also sent my social worker an email in July 2022 asking to be assessed for financial support and had written in the email that we only had child benefit Income coming into the household at that time, so they knew.

Can I request minutes of the meeting in November 2022 where the two social workers and their managers met to discuss if I could have support or the panel meeting where it was agreed as we were given to understand that we were receiving the equivalent allowance as what we were to receive under SGO. Thank you if you can advise.

[Robin D]

Hi C****.

If you have not already done so. start a formal complaint. The details of where to send it should be on the local authority website. In that complaint you can ask for copies of the appropriate minutes, but basically you want the them to stand by what they said. There is a lot of help with the complaints process at https://frg.org.uk/get-help-and-advice/what/complaints/.

If you don't start at the beginning of the process than the Local Government Ombudsman cannot take on the case.

Good luck .... Robin

*edited by Suzie to ensure confidentiality as required by the Rules of Use.

[CY23]

Thank you Robin for your reply. I am in the process of making a formal complaint about so many other things so I will add it to the list. We were lucky enough to have a solicitor act pro bono for us on the last hearing after the LA took out the support they previously had put in there. He is also a district judge and he has advised us to make a formal complaint about 6 things already and then he said when that is done he has given us the name of a solicitors firm and advised us to bring a claim against the Local Authority for failing to protect from harm on behalf of our child. It just feels so sad, stressful and weary to have to battle something else considering our local council has written in their policy that they don’t deduct child benefit for people on income based benefits. But on we battle. Thank you for the advice. Much appreciated

[Suzie, FRG Adviser]

Hi everyone,
I looked after my godson under an interim CAO until September 2023 where I became his Special Guardian. Whilst being assessed for a SGO I was financially assessed by the Connected Persons team and a figure of £202.06 was calculated. Unfortunately this was not calculated on the correct information on these two points 1) it had been previously agreed twice at panel that I could receive the full allowance and no deductions for Child benefit or child tax credit made as I am on income based ESA. 2) My LA have an unlawful policy as they have two different rates- £223.86 for Kinship Carers and £230.58 for foster carers. I have had to get these two points rectified, which they have been now in time to finalise the SGO. However, I asked my child’s social workers team to assess me for financial support and at first they refused but then the connected persons social worker had a meeting with the Children's services side and it was agreed that I would receive the same allowance that I would get under SGO and that they would pay that until the SGO was finalised. This was because it was delayed and took three years to conclude. The problem is that when they started to pay the allowance they took the figure from the connected persons financial assessments and paid £202.06 which deducted the child benefit and was calculated at the incorrect kinship rate. When I told them that it all had to be sorted out as it was incorrect they said that is fine, if there is anything owing then it will be backdated. The children’s services team only started to pay the correct allowance on July 11 2023. This was the full SGO allowance equal to the fostering rate with no deductions. They paid this every week until the SGO was finalised in 22 September 2023 when it transferred to the connected persons team who pay the full allowance no deductions. However, I did not receive any of the backdated correct allowance back to November 2022. I have written to ask them for this and they have done a 360 turn and completely changed the narrative. They are saying that they deduct the child benefit and they cannot duplicate it. When I said but it has been agreed that it won’t be deducted because I am in income based benefits, they said that’s when the SGO starts, not before. This is a different narrative to what they agreed to pay- the SGO allowance. I think they have changed this to evade paying backdated allowance. It really doesn’t make sense and I don’t think they quite understand as they are saying they will need to deduct child benefit from November 2022 to 4 July 2023 but then they have paid the full allowance with no deductions from 11 July 2023 to 22 September 2023. They also said we didn’t know you were getting child benefit, which they did because it was in my financial assessment, I had an in-depth conversation with my child’s social worker about all the incorrect calculations where I told her we received it. She had brought the cash of the 12 weeks backdated Child benefit to give me but I didn’t accept it as I said that I wanted to sort it all out first. She took it away and said that it could be backdated when it was all sorted out. Now they have said we didn’t know you were receiving child benefit so that’s why we said that but now we are deducting it. I had also sent my social worker an email in July 2022 asking to be assessed for financial support and had written in the email that we only had child benefit Income coming into the household at that time, so they knew.

Can I request minutes of the meeting in November 2022 where the two social workers and their managers met to discuss if I could have support or the panel meeting where it was agreed as we were given to understand that we were receiving the equivalent allowance as what we were to receive under SGO. Thank you if you can advise.

Dear CY23

Thank you for your further post. I see that you have had a helpful response from another poster to your query and would simply add that as special guardians you can make a request for records related to the child in question held by children’s services.

You can also ask that children’s services provide you with their written reasons for not honouring what they told you about backdated payments. It would help if you had your own record related to dates and times as well as the name of the person giving the information to you.

Please see our advice sheet on making a complaint. You will be aware that if you complete the complaints procedure with children’s services and remain dissatisfied, you can take the complaint to the Local Government ombudsman man to investigate the case and your complaint further.

Here is the link to our website advice sheet relating to access to records

I hope this is helpful.

Best wishes

Suzie

[CY23]

Thank you.