Public Health complaints policy

The Gateshead Public Health Team is responsible for ill-health prevention, health improvement, health protection assurance, public health advice and has an overarching objective of reducing health inequalities in Gateshead. Delivery of our Health and Wellbeing Strategy Policy objectives is key for us in achieving these functions. 
The ambition of our Public Health Team is to use our strengths, skills, resources and assets to tackle inequalities, improve health and wellbeing, and enable people in Gateshead to thrive. 

Public Health welcomes complaints, compliments and comments from its customers and recognises that things can go wrong occasionally and people may not be happy with the service they have received.  

Complaints are valuable to Public Health as they: 

• give customers the opportunity to provide feedback on its services 
• give Public Health the opportunity to put things right where mistakes have been made 
• allows Public Health to improve its services and make sure mistakes are not repeated 

This policy sets out Public Health's approach when dealing with customer complaints in relation to matters relating to its public health functions. The aim of this policy is to provide guidance and expectations when investigating and resolving formal complaints or issues raised by the council's customers, or their representatives. 

The policy is also applicable to service providers that provide public health functions on behalf of the Council, such as the NHS and third sector organisations.  

Public health complaints and how they are managed are governed by the NHS Bodies and Local Authorities (Partnership Arrangements, Care Trusts, Public Health and Local Healthwatch) Regulations 2012 (the Regulations) which came into effect in April 2013. 

If a complaint is about a the Children Social Care Service, Adult Social Care services, general council services, housing matters, or an elected official, it will be dealt with under a separate policy. Refer to the Council's Corporate Complaints and Compliments Policy for further information. 

When dealing with a complaint under this policy, the council's Public Health team will follow these guiding principles: 

• we are committed to ensuring everyone knows how to complain and how a complaint will be handled by the council     
• the council will make reasonable adjustments where necessary so that our customers can fairly access our complaints process
• we will ensure that complaints are addressed fairly and consistently across the council 
• we will ensure that complaints are monitored, and we will learn from our mistakes to improve our services
• improve customer satisfaction and confidence in the way the council handles complaints and provides its services
• provide customers with the opportunity to provide feedback on its services  
• gives the council the opportunity to put things right where mistakes have been made. 

This policy will be published online and anyone can ask for a printed copy from a council-maintained centre.