Luton Borough Council fined after failing to deal with carer's grant request

Luton Borough Council has been ordered to pay a Bedfordshire resident £200 for failing to deal with his request for a carer’s grant in 2021 and not communicating with him properly later that year.

The council’s failings resulted in him missing out on the chance to be considered for a carer’s grant in 2022 and left him without the support he needs as his mother’s carer, according to a local government and social care ombudsman’s report.

Luton Borough Council (LBC) assessed his needs as his mother’s carer and gave him one-off carer’s direct payments, said the ombudsman’s report. The report stated: “An occupational therapist put him on the list for a carer’s assessment. The council assigned an officer for this in January 2021. LBC assessed his carer’s needs in February.”

The officer’s assessment noted his ‘significant role in caring for his mother’ and ‘identified £150 as his ‘indicative budget score’ and which the council agreed to pay him as a one-off carer’s grant as a contribution towards buying a tablet’.

LBC uses an encryption service to send emails to protect people’s personal data. But the report explained: “He says this was too difficult to follow and he was unable to read a message from the therapist.”

In March 2022, a complaint about discrimination and unfair treatment was lodged on his behalf, saying ‘his needs weren’t addressed a year earlier and he’d been denied a carer’s direct payment in 2020 and 2022, missing out on £400’.

The report added: “He wanted to apply for a carer’s direct payment for 2023, but assumed this would be denied again. He complained to the ombudsman in October. LBC said it had no record of receiving his complaint in March 2022.

“The therapist hadn’t noticed he was using a new email address which wasn’t registered with the encryption service.”

According to the ombudsman’s report, LBC apologised for not contacting him to review the outcome of the direct payment, putting this down to Covid-19-related demands on its service. It also apologised if ‘an administrative error meant his complaint wasn’t received and for a misunderstanding about using the encryption service with the distress this caused’.

The report stated: “LBC says the decision to pay a carer’s direct payment of £150 was based on the average cost of a Bluetooth-enabled tablet bought over the internet.

“But there’s nothing in its records to suggest it checked the average cost of such a tablet. The evidence indicates LBC paid him £150 because that was his ‘indicative budget score’, rather than enough to buy a tablet to meet his needs.”

The ombudsman said: “That was fault by LBC as was poor communication over the emails. It resulted in him not being considered for a carer’s grant in 2022, causing unnecessary distress.

“LBC must apologise for the failure to deal properly with his carer’s grant in 2021, the poor communication later that year, the distress and time spent pursuing his complaint, and pay him £200.”