When Safeguarding Fails Both Young and Old

Why adult and children’s social services need a systemic reset — and what Rochdale reveals

Across England, social services are supposed to be the frontline of dignity and protection. They exist to uphold the rights of children, vulnerable adults, and families at times of crisis. Yet for too many, the system has become synonymous not with protection, but with neglect, bureaucracy, and institutional failings. While children’s safeguarding failures attract headlines, adult social services—covering care for older people, disabled adults, and those with mental health needs—suffer crises of equal, if not greater, magnitude. Rochdale Council is again a case study in what happens when local governance falters and corruption or institutional self-protection replaces accountability.

Adult social services: a system stretched to breaking

Adult social care is the largest part of most councils’ budgets, yet the least reformed. Decades of underfunding, rising demand, and reliance on fragile care markets have left services “failing by design.” The Care Quality Commission’s State of Care reports repeatedly flag staff shortages, unsafe discharge practices from hospitals, and long waits for assessments and care packages. Nationally, over half a million people wait for social care assessments or reviews at any one time, with some dying before they receive help.

For older people, delays mean months stuck in hospital beds—lonely, deteriorating physically and mentally—while councils argue over funding. For adults with disabilities or mental health needs, failures manifest as inadequate supported housing, minimal day-to-day support, or, in the most serious cases, unnecessary detention under mental health legislation.

Unlike children’s services, adult safeguarding rarely provokes political outcry until a scandal breaks. Yet the systemic neglect is profound, often leading to indignities like bed-bathing in corridors, rationed food care, or unlawful restrictions on liberty.

Rochdale Council: adult services under the microscope

Rochdale’s children’s safeguarding failures are well documented. Less visible, but equally troubling, are its adult social services:

Ombudsman rulings show a pattern of maladministration in adult care assessments, delays in arranging services, and unlawful charging policies. In 2024/25, the Local Government & Social Care Ombudsman (LGSCO) upheld 85% of complaints investigated against Rochdale—and in none of these had the council remedied the fault before escalation. That “0% satisfactory remedy” rate is a hallmark of defensiveness, not service learning.

SEND and adult disability services: In March 2025, Rochdale was exposed for a backlog of nearly 1,500 overdue Education, Health and Care Plan reviews. While technically a “children’s” function, the impact falls squarely into adulthood, delaying crucial transitions and lifelong support.

Older people’s services: Families have raised repeated concerns about delayed care packages, inconsistent safeguarding responses for adults at risk of abuse, and placements dictated by availability or cost rather than individual need.

Mental health and detention: Echoing wider national trends, Rochdale residents have reported involuntary detentions and forced treatment under mental health legislation, with questions raised about whether such measures serve care or convenience.

The picture is familiar: unlawful policy, poor management grip, complaints resisted until legally compelled, and a culture that prioritises the council’s reputation and budget over citizens’ dignity.

The wider problem: corruption by another name

“Corruption” in local social care rarely looks like outright bribery. It often means something subtler but equally corrosive:

Market capture: A small number of private providers charging excessive rates for care homes or supported living, while councils pass the costs onto taxpayers and ration provision.

Defensive governance: Councils writing unlawful policies (for charging, eligibility, or guardianship payments) and then fighting Ombudsman rulings in court rather than fixing the root problem.

Targeting dissenters: Families, whistleblowers, and even professionals who raise concerns find themselves sidelined or threatened rather than heard.

The result is the same as in children’s services: a system that shields itself rather than the people it is supposed to serve.

Reform must not be child-centred alone

The MacAlister Review (2022) called for a “reset” of children’s social care, with family-help hubs, kinship guarantees, and stronger workforce support. These are welcome, but adult social care requires no less urgency. If anything, the pressures are greater: an ageing population, longer life expectancy with disability, and a workforce crisis exacerbated by Brexit and low pay.

National reforms for adults have been endlessly promised, endlessly delayed. A proposed £86,000 lifetime cap on care costs was postponed again until at least 2025, leaving many families exposed to catastrophic bills. The Care Act 2014’s vision of wellbeing, independence, and prevention has been hollowed out by austerity and reactive practice.

What must change

1. Guaranteed right to timely adult care. Just as children are entitled to timely safeguarding, adults should have a legally enforceable right to an assessment and provision within a fixed timescale.

2. Financial transparency and market reform. Extend Competition & Markets Authority findings to adult care providers: publish profits, cap excessive returns, and ensure councils aren’t captured by a handful of private firms.

3. End unlawful charging and rationing. National standards must prevent councils from designing unlawful policies that block access to services until families litigate.

4. Independent safeguarding pathways. Adults at risk need speak-up routes separate from councils, including independent advocates empowered to challenge decisions.

5. Whistleblower protection across services. Protect staff and families who expose neglect—whether in a care home, a mental health unit, or a children’s residential setting.

6. Workforce renewal. Invest in fair pay, professional development, and stability. Without a sustainable workforce, neither adult nor child protection will function.

Bottom line

Rochdale’s record—in both adult and children’s social services—shows what happens when councils protect themselves instead of their citizens. Adult services, often hidden from view, are at least as compromised as children’s services: chronically underfunded, poorly managed, and too often unjust.

Reform cannot be piecemeal. It must confront the corruption of low expectations, the profit-driven market, and the institutional instinct to silence criticism. Until then, both children and adults remain at risk—not from strangers in the shadows, but from the very institutions designed to safeguard them.