Ombudsman links rise in complaints to recession

COMPLAINTS TO the office of the Ombudsman have risen to the highest levels in over a decade as victims of the recession struggle to access social welfare and other benefits.

Ombudsman Emily O’Reilly said the huge rise in complaints to her office last year was predictable given the scale and depth of Ireland’s recession.

It also underlined the difficulty people continued to have in dealing with public bodies and the increasingly bureaucratic and complex administration of public policy.

The fact that more people were engaging with public bodies should not lead to lower standards of people being unfairly treated, she warned.

Overall, the number of complaints rose 30 per cent last year, to 3,727. Complaints against the HSE were up 44 per cent and accounted for over one-quarter of the total.

Complaints against the civil service grew by 39 per cent to account for almost half of all complaints. Complaints against local authorities were up 14 per cent and those against An Post increased by 23 per cent.

Complaints against the Department of Social Protection rose by 53 per cent in 2010 to 1,181 as more people sought to gain entitlement to unemployment benefits.

The ombudsman has “named and shamed” a number of Government departments and local authorities for failing to update their websites to include contact details for her office despite repeated requests over a three-year period.

An audit found details lacking in the websites of the Departments of Tourism, Culture and Sport; Education; Foreign Affairs; Justice; and Transport.

The online presence of county councils in Carlow, Clare, Fingal, Galway, Kerry and Donegal was also faulted.

Ms O’Reilly strongly welcomed the Government’s commitment to extend the remit of her office to all publicly funded bodies.

She said that this had been promised since 1994 and would bring bodies dealing with prisons, refugees and applicants for citizenship under the remit of the ombudsman.

She said official contacts had opened between staff in the new Department of Public Expenditure and Reform and her own officials about implementing the changes proposed in the programme for government.

The ombudsman also welcomed the Government commitment to establish a new Oireachtas committee as a formal channel of consultation between the Oireachtas and the ombudsman.

Ms O’Reilly said she looked forward to working with the committee to support the independence of her office.

She said most of the changes she had put forward, which also included a constitutional status for her office, would need new legislation but little additional expenditure. Some 1,317 complaints made last year were outside Ms O’Reilly’s jurisdiction, up 22 per cent when compared to 2009. Most of these were referred to other bodies such as the financial services or pensions ombudsman, she said.

COMPLAINTS TO OMBUDSMAN: CASE STUDIES

* A separated woman from Dublin had her claim for one-parent family payments refused on the grounds that she had failed to disclose her means. The Department of Social Protection made the decision after €3,500 had been paid into three loan accounts when the woman had only €3,000 available to her.

The ombudsman on investigation found files in the department’s possession which showed that most of the €3,500 came from her husband.

The department, on being shown this evidence, changed its stance and paid €16,708 in arrears to the woman.

* A young mother who was immobile as a result of a car crash complained about the failure of the HSE’s personal assistant service to meet her parenting needs. The HSE agreed to provide eight hours of parenting support for her son though there were delays in setting this up. The ombudsman found there were no grounds to uphold the complaint and congratulated the HSE on its flexible approach.

* An elderly man was recuperating in hospital after a leg amputation when he was told he would have to be discharged as there were no public beds available. He was told he would have to go to a private nursing hospital but would only have to stay there for six weeks. However, it took almost 23 weeks before he was ready to leave and he paid almost €16,000 towards the cost of his care in the home.

The ombudsman found that the HSE failed to inform the 71-year-old man of his rights to a nursing home subvention. It agreed to process an application for a subvention and awarded the man almost €7,000.