Milton Keynes Council is failing to carry out a safeguarding inquiry in response to as many as 9 in 10 warnings about abuse of vulnerable adults, a charity has warned.
Action on Elder Abuse (AEA), analysed official adult safeguarding statistics and found that Milton Keynes was one of the 10 councils least likely to launch a protection inquiry when abuse is suspected.
Despite 2,445 concerns about abuse being reported to the local authority in 2016/17 – covering everything from beatings and thefts to sexual assault and neglect – just 240 (10%) were deemed to merit a safeguarding inquiry.
This is far lower than the average across England (41%). And in the 11 best performing areas, councils routinely launched investigations in response to all reports of abuse. This means there were 2,205 cases in Milton Keynes that would have triggered a full investigation if they had happened elsewhere.
A spokesman from Milton Keynes Council told MKFM: "We’re analysing the stats, they don’t paint an accurate picture, and we would stress that where there is a serious safeguarding issue and serious concern, then we would act very promptly."
