The Year’s Work

In early 1998 my Office moved to new premises at 18 Lr. Leeson St. in Dublin which now houses the staffs of the Ombudsman, the Information Commissioner and of the Public Offices Commission. I was particularly honoured with the visit of Her Excellency, President Mary McAleese, who performed the official opening of my new offices on 18 May 1998. I very much appreciated the President’s supportive remarks regarding the important work of the three offices involved.

Public Access and Awareness

During 1998 I received a total of 3,779 complaints compared to a total of 3,929 in 1997. Full details on complaint statistics are given in Chapter Six.

My Office paid monthly visits to Citizens Information Centres (CICs) in Cork, Galway, Limerick, Waterford and, for the first time in 1998, to Portlaoise. These visits, designed to facilitate people who might wish to make a complaint in person rather than in writing, were a great success. In all, there were 716 callers at these CIC visits which represents an increase of 46% over the previous year’s figure of 491 callers. I would like to thank all those involved, including the National Social Service Board and the CICs, for their continued support in publicising these services. One-day visits to take complaints from the public were made by my staff to Letterkenny, Sligo, Mullingar and Swords. A total of 207 people called to these centres. The visit to Swords was part of a programme, which I began in 1997, to make my Office more accessible to people in the Greater Dublin Area. The results were disappointing with only 11 people calling. This highlights again the difficulty of reaching people in the capital as opposed to those in provincial cities and towns.

As I said in last year’s Report, I believe that the Area Based Partnerships can assist in facilitating access by their clients to the services of my Office. As part of my initiative in this regard, my Office recently addressed a national conference of the Area Based Partnerships.

Market research, which I reported on last year, indicated that while 81% of respondents said that they had heard of the Office, only 34% were aware that it can deal with complaints from the public. Clearly, much remains to be done to increase public awareness. Within the limits of my budget, any public awareness initiatives are necessarily selective and are targeted at those sections of the community which I feel are most likely to require the services of my Office. Information on the Office, including details of the planned programme of regional and CIC visits for 1999, is published at www.irlgov.ie/ombudsman/ on the Internet.

Relations with Bodies within Remit

Relations with the public bodies within my jurisdiction remain generally very good and I receive a high level of co-operation from them. I am grateful to the liaison officers appointed by the bodies - and more particularly to those liaison officers in the bodies with whom I have most contact - for the part they play in ensuring that complaints can be examined expeditiously. In a small number of cases each year it becomes necessary to invoke Section 7 of the Ombudsman Act in order to get the body concerned to provide a response or relevant information in relation to a complaint. A Section 7 notice requires the provision of a response or information (including attendance before me, where deemed necessary) by a specified date. Such a notice is issued only as a last resort after both verbal and written reminders have failed to elicit a response. In last year’s Report I said that, beginning with the 1998 Report, I would publish details of Section 7 notices sent to each public body. In all, 45 Section 7 notices were issued during 1998. Details of the bodies concerned, and of the percentage represented by the Section 7 cases of total complaints received by my Office against that body, are given below.

I prefer to deal with complaints without invoking my statutory powers. But, where necessary, I will issue Section 7 notices and publish details of such notices each year.

Contacts with other Ombudsman Offices

During 1998 my Office continued its active participation in international Ombudsman activities through membership of the International Ombudsman Institute (IOI) and of the British and Irish Ombudsman Association. On the European level, I attended the Council of Europe’s Sixth Round Table with European Ombudsmen, held in Malta, which focused on human rights issues. On the wider international level, I attended (in my capacity as one of the four Regional Directors for Europe) a meeting of the IOI Board of Directors held in Islamabad. At the invitation of the Turkish Government, I visited Ankara in February to meet with Ministers and members of the Parliamentary Committee on Human Rights to discuss the operation of the Ombudsman institution both here in Ireland and internationally. I was also pleased to be of some assistance to my Greek colleague, Professor Nikiforos Diamandouros, who was appointed as Greece’s first national Ombudsman during 1998. At his invitation, I visited Athens in December to participate in a workshop with the staff of his newly established Office.

My contacts with the European Ombudsman, Mr. Jacob Soderman, continue and during the year I referred two complaints to him. An account of one of these cases is given in Chapter Four.

Finally, I would like to say how encouraged I am by the messages of support received from other Ombudsmen and, in particular, by their complimentary remarks about the quality of my Annual Reports. Some of my colleagues sought my permission to produce a guide similar to my “Guide to Standards of Best Practice for Public Servants”, or to draw from my “Guide to Internal Complaints Systems”, and I was pleased to facilitate them.

Strategic Management Initiative

As I indicated in the Introduction to this Report, the establishment of the Office of the Information Commissioner and my involvement with the Referendum Commission imposed considerable demands on my staff and myself during 1998.

Up to now, strategic planning in the Office has concentrated on my core function as Ombudsman. But, as with any organisation which takes on a substantial range of additional responsibilities, my staff and I have now started to develop an overall strategy for our various functions which, in turn, will lead to the development of specific plans at business unit level.

In common with many other Government Departments and Offices, my Office recently established a Partnership Committee which has an active involvement in the implementation of the Office’s strategic plans and the change management programme.

North-South Implementation Bodies

Among the issues provided for in the Agreement reached in the Multi-Party Negotiations in Belfast in 1998 were areas for North-South co-operation and arrangements for implementation of that co-operation. The proposed North-South Implementation Bodies, as they are called, will discharge public administration functions which will impact on the people of Northern Ireland and of the Republic of Ireland. One of the issues arising in relation to their establishment is the provision of a complaints resolution mechanism.

Following consultation with my Office and that of my colleague, Mr Gerry Burns, Ombudsman of Northern Ireland, proposals have been formulated whereby both of our Offices would have jurisdiction in relation to complaints of maladministration against the Implementation Bodies.

Perhaps the most interesting feature of the proposals is the provision for both Ombudsmen to submit joint annual reports to their respective legislatures on the performance of their functions in relation to the Implementation Bodies. In the hope that it proves possible to bring this, and all the other important elements of the Agreement to fruition, I look forward in this context to further developing our close working relationship with our colleagues in the Northern Ireland Ombudsman’s Office.

Complaint Statistics

During 1998 I received a total of 3,779 complaints compared to a total of 3,929 received in 1997. This represents a decrease of approximately 4% over the 1997 figure. However, the 1997 figure itself represented an increase of 24% over the previous year’s total of 3,181 - the figure for complaints received in 1995 was 2,879. Of the 3,779 complaints received in 1998 it transpired that 903 of them were not within my remit. This left a balance of 2,876 valid complaints received. It is of some interest that the level of invalid complaints received in 1998 increased by 12% by comparison with the figure for 1997. In part, this may reflect a perception that my Office already deals with areas of the wider public sector which are, pending amendment of the Ombudsman Act, currently outside my remit.

In looking at the details of valid complaints received during 1998, almost 50% of them related to civil service bodies; 24% related to local authorities and 17% related to health boards. Of the complaints against civil service bodies, 56% related to the Department of Social, Community and Family Affairs; 14% involved the Department of Agriculture and Food; 10% were against the Department of Education and Science while 9% related to the Revenue Commissioners.

There are some interesting features to note in analysing the valid complaints received against individual bodies and areas. Complaints against the Department of Social, Community & Family Affairs (DSCFA) are down roughly 22% by comparison with the 1997 figure. However, the 1997 complaints figure for that Department represented an increase of more than 50% on the previous year’s figure; and the 1998 DSCFA complaints figure remains well above the figures for the three years prior to 1997. Complaints against local authorities are down by about 9% and Telecom Éireann complaints are reduced by about 13%. On the other side, however, complaints against the health boards are up by 20% relative to 1997 and there was a 6% increase in valid complaints against the Department of Education and Science.

In terms of the outcome of valid complaints completed during 1998, the overall pattern is similar to that of last year. Of the 3,052 complaints completed in 1998, 503 were resolved and in 1,066 cases assistance was provided. This means that in 1,569 cases (51% of the total) the complainant received some form of redress. In recording the outcome of complaints, my Office has for many years used the category “Assistance Provided” to cover a range of outcomes in which complaints have not been fully upheld (“Resolved“) but in which the complainant has benefited as a result of having made the complaint. From 1999 onwards I will be employing an additional category, “Partially Resolved”, which perhaps more accurately reflects the outcome of many the cases currently categorised as “Assistance Provided”.

A detailed statistical analysis of complaints received, and of the outcome on complaints completed, is given at Chapter Six. My Office has some additional statistical material, not published below, which will be provided on request.