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Public Services Ombudsman investigation focuses on 'trust' |
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Thursday, 23 October 2008 |
The Scottish Public Services Ombudsman, Professor Alice Brown, put before the Scottish Parliament yesterday 13 different investigation reports – six about the local government sector, four concerning health, two about higher education and one on a Scottish Government body.
For a number of health boards she looked at their complaint handling, while at local government level she investigated East Lothian Council's Building Control Department and the planning process for both South Ayrshire Council and Fife Council.
She also looked at Aberdeenshire Council's free school transport policy and a complaint raised against North Lanarkshire Council in its handling of a school playground incident.
A number of recommendations were made, but the ombudsman decided not to uphold complaints about the academic appeal process at the University of Abertay and University of Glasgow, or a complaint made against the Scottish Commission for the Regulation of Care about a member of staff.
The ombudsman refers to 'trust' in her overview of the investigations, which is set to be the main theme for her forthcoming annual report.
Ranging from complaints about planning to concerns about a nursery inspection, Brown suggests the one common theme is they are the result of breakdown in trust in the relationship between service user and service provider.
Brown is hopeful of helping restore this relationship before she steps down in March 2009.
Readers have left 2 comments. 1. Public Services Ombudsman investigation focuses on 'trust'
Trevor Nunn, Unregistered Alice Brown has avoided the key issue. That's the breakdown in trust between the people of Scotland and her own office. Ombudsmen are part of the problem not part of the solution. Citizens complaints about public sector organisations need to be handled by an open and honest system of administrative justice not the secretive and unaccountable court of star chamber approach that all British Public Service Ombudsmen have adopted. 2. Public Services Ombudsman investigation focuses on 'trust'
Anonymous, Unregistered In my experience, the Scottish Public Services Ombudsman is not there to provide administrative justice, the opposite is true, they are there to protect the authorities from valid complaints. The comments quoted from the SPSO's own 2007 customer feedback reportexplains how the public views the SPSO. Quote:
1. Excessive time taken to deal with complaint
2. SPSO did not investigate properly / look into fully
3. Total disgrace / would never use again / complete waste of time / incompetent
4. Investigation was biased / public have no chance / never on complainants side
5. SPSO was no help / not interested / favoured the Council / there to fool the public
6. Very poor service / service badly structured
7. Staff not knowledgeable / unqualified
8. Stop avoiding / ignoring complaints / questions / issues
9. Nothing happened / no outcome / still no explanation
10. Waste of public funding
11. SPSO did nothing / did not take on the case
12. Complaints not dealt with / unfairly dealt with
13. Very poor / weak reasons for not investigating / dismissed without adequate explanation
14. SPSO afraid to deal with Council / will not take on Council / Council always wins
15. Not helpful / unhelpful / no support given
16. Investigation poor / fragmented / spasmodic
17. Decision based on Council’s say
18. SPSO exists only as a pretence / there is no complaint rights
The above comments were published by the SPSO and show how the public view their
service.
If you want to know more about how the SPSO operates then please visit the web site www.scottishombudsmanwatch.org or review the Scottish Parliament Public Petitions PE1076, PE 1163, PE1186 and PE 1190 which have been submitted this year.
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