Part 1 of the sorry tale can be found here:

http://regulatorwatch.co.uk/2009/07/mrs-c-and-the-gscc/

TO CONTINUE:

In April 2002 the then NCSC (National Care Standards Commission) came into existence and on day two of its establishment as a registration body ‘Mrs C’ began to complain to them about ‘Happen Fostercare.’ This is in addition to the complaints made to Northamptonshire and the new fostering agency (local authority) she joined. Mrs C would contest that she complained to the latter, but to ‘Paul’ it seemed quite obvious that it was a complaint, certainly the meeting he attended to support Happen Fostercare with the local authority felt very much like a complaint meeting.

So by this stage there are at least three ongoing complaints and certainly by May/June of 2002 the NCSC were investigating, not aware of the other complaints (or at least not initially aware). That must set alarm bells ringing for any reasonable thinking person, me thinks. And that is what Paul was thinking. Likewise he recognised the seriousness of the allegations but as events turned out Paul reports that Northamptonshire accepted responsibility for basic piss poor practice in not supplying a foster carer with the appropriate background information on the child, which related to suspected but not proven sexual predator activity in relation to vulnerable children. Not good, one might say.

Just to recap the NCSC grew out of the Care Standards Act 2000 which in part was based on the north Wales child abuse inquiry known as the Whitehouse Report, Lost in Care

Also from that Act grew the GSCC and SCIE. Eventually the NCSC became the CSCI (Commission for Social Care Inspection) which lost its child care regulatory functions to Ofsted – those functions being registration and inspection of various children’s services provisions such as fostering, adoption, residential care, day care etc., etc.

CSCI no longer exists – described by many commentators as the ‘end of an error’ as distinct from the end of era. It was headed up by the former SSI (Social Services Inspectorate) chief Denise Platt, or as others referred to her as Pratt! As an SSI inspector Denise seemed, to Wilt at least, quite grounded and sensible, but in terms of the NCSC and CSCI she was a complete disaster.

However, back to Mrs C and the GSCC debacle. The GSCC element comes much later in this story of sorrow, mishap, utter incompetence and a failure to grasp the nettle until too late. I reiterate these events as reported precede the current management of Happen Fostercare.

The newly formed NCSC (April 2002) took up the cudgel on behalf of Mrs C. They made a unannounced visit to Happen Fostercare based on, what transpired, a misinformed understanding of their powers and duties in relation to complaints from, as in this case a foster carer, Mrs C. The NCSC never had the power to investigate a complaint against a registered body (and by which time Happen Fostercare was not anyway yet registered) – that duty lay with the fostering agency under the then Regulations and the NCSC had a duty under its inspection regime and separate Regulations and Standards to ‘monitor’ the handling of a complaint. If they (NCSC) felt that Happen Fostercare did not handle it appropriately or if there remained concerns about practice and compliance with standards, then that could be addressed in a inspection of the agency, with any consequential action following which could range from making ‘recommendations’, setting out statutory ‘requirements’ or at worst seeking the de-registration (or as in this case not registering) the agency.

In effect their further actions were ultra virus – exceeding their powers.

Effectively what took place was the conduct of a complaint investigation (which was in effect unlawful, as they had no power or remit) and confused matters further by calling it an unannounced inspection – thus confusing ‘complaint investigation’ and ‘inspection.’ It was an utter firkin mess, to say the least.

To be fair to the ‘inspectors’ (who Paul also met and corresponded with) were somewhat lacking policy and procedural or informed managerial guidance – Paul himself did not pick up on it either, as none possibly would have done at the time, that the NCSC were outside of their remit, powers or authority.

Definitely not good news for the NCSC or, as it transpired several others least of all Happen Fostercare or Paul, but others also. Mrs C can claim many casualties in her quest for fame and being the claim of ‘worst victim’ of the 20^th/21^st Century. Things get much worse, really, honestly.

As matters transpired the (unlawful) complaint investigation found no fault with Happen Fostercare – they were not to blame for the piss poor practice of Northamptonshire who bravely took it on the chin that they were at fault, through poor social work practice.

And let’s be clear here, Happen Fostercare had actually commissioned an independent complaint investigator (Paul) via the Fostering Network (with whom he was ‘registered’ as an external consultant) to investigate and Mrs C had elected instead to ‘jump ship’ and join another agency rather than address the issues, via independent facilitation (of Paul), with Happen Fostercare and, hopefully, find a resolution.

Now to be fair to Mrs C, Happen Fostercare handled her initial complaint badly – that much Happen Fostercare admit. But the subsequent events do not fit with any persons (perhaps other than Mrs C and her MP) concept of proportionality or simple sense of humanity.

There followed NCSC investigation of complaint Part 1, with Part 1a, Part 2 and Part 3 all of which were in fact, unlawful as the NCSC had no powers to investigate, let alone report. Eventually, the part three investigation hit the national newspapers, Community Care (in various parts) and in Parliament – yes Parliament, courtesy of Mrs Cs MP, the odd fellow with a dubious allowance claims record, James Plaskitt.

The part three (unlawful) complaint investigation was undertaken without any discussion with, knowledge of or consultation on its remit or content with Happen Fostercare – it was simply done and then published.. The fist Happen knew about it was when calls started to be made about press reports and concerns raised by faxed copies of the third stage report received by local authorities and others – sent with glee by Mrs C.

In years subsequent a CSCI (the successor agency of the NCSC) published a report. Here is part 1 to begin with:

Click here for Part One

Part two and three of that report to follow, soon.

Part three of the story will also follow soon, and then we can get onto the GSCC proper – among others. We will also reveal in full the itentities of the significant participants.

Scary stuff.

Wilt (in collaboration with Paul)