asked Her Majesty's Government:

What actions the Department of Health will take to ensure that the experiences described in the Joint Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman and Local Government Ombudsman report, Injustice in Residential Care, are not repeated. [HL2980]

Local councils and health trusts are responsible for ensuring that the needs of service users and patients are properly assessed and that those needs are met. To safeguard service users and patients, local councils and the National Health Service are required by law to have formal complaints procedures and to help and assist service users and patients who may wish to make use of them. In the event that anyone is not satisfied with the way their complaint has been dealt with, they are entitled to ask the Local Government Ombudsman to investigate complaints against local councils and the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman to investigate complaints against the NHS.

The Regulatory Reform (Collaboration etc. between Ombudsmen) Order 2007, which came into force on 1 August 2007, enables the ombudsmen to work together more effectively in investigating and reporting on complaints which cross their jurisdictions.

The Injustice in Residential Care report, which deals with the failures of Buckinghamshire County Council and the Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire Mental Health Partnership Trust to provide adequate services to a service user with severe learning disabilities, is the result of the first collaborative investigation between the Local Government Ombudsman and Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman under the new arrangements. A copy of the report has been placed in the Library.

It is important to note that the findings in the report, unacceptable as they are, were focused on the failure by a single council and mental health trust to deliver quality services to an individual service user. We expect the local authority (LA) and the trust to revise their policies to ensure no reoccurrence of these events. It is the responsibility of all LAs and health trusts to identify the required resources from the funding the Government provide, to ensure that they are delivering appropriate services.