STATEMENT:OMBUDSMAN EMILY O'Reilly has accused the Government of undertaking the "most serious" jurisdictional challenge mounted against her office since its establishment.
She has also strongly criticised the Department of Health and the Health Service Executive (HSE) for refusing to co-operate with her inquiry into the State’s responsibility to provide long-term nursing home care for the elderly.
Her report Who Cares? describes how she faced “an unprecedented level of rancour and disagreement” from the Department of Health, and to a lesser extent the HSE. She said the department accused the ombudsman of undertaking the inquiry in “bad faith” and refused to provide information.
“This unprecedented opposition to an Ombudsman investigation appears to arise primarily – but not solely – from a deep- seated concern that any acceptance of the validity of the report’s analysis could have enormous financial implications for the State,” says the 135-page report on the inquiry. Ms O’Reilly says there is also “very clearly a problem of a lack of transparency, and a pattern of willingness to frustrate statutory investigation”.
During almost a year of correspondence the Department of Health made a number of allegations, including that the ombudsman had exceeded her jurisdiction; failed to abide by fair procedures . . . displayed prejudice, objective bias and arrogance in purporting to interpret the law.
Ms O’Reilly concludes that the challenges by the Minister for Health did not compromise her independence but “no other minister has ever written to the Ombudsman in such terms.”