Decision Report 201802493

Summary

Mrs C complained that the council had failed to provide accurate information for couples seeking to adopt and that they unreasonably prevented her from progressing her adoption application. Mrs C said that she had not been clearly informed that her weight would be an issue, or how much weight she needed to lose in order to progress. Mrs C also felt that the process was unfair as it relied on Body Mass Index (a measure for estimating human body fat) which she felt was not an accurate measure of her health.

We found that the council had provided appropriate information to Mrs C in relation to weight and adoption. We also found that the council had appropriately followed medical advice and had not unreasonably prevented Mrs C from progressing her adoption assessment. Therefore, we did not uphold these aspects of Mrs C's complaint.

In relation to complaint handling, we found that the council had not handled Mrs C's complaint reasonably. Therefore, we upheld this aspect of Mrs C's complaint. We noted that the council had recognised and apologised for this failing and we made no further recommendations.