Ombudsman says agencies escape scrutiny

The creation of 450 "single purpose" agencies to fulfil functions once covered by Government ministers and their departments …

The creation of 450 "single purpose" agencies to fulfil functions once covered by Government ministers and their departments means the public are increasingly unable to complain about them to her office, the Ombudsman Emily O'Reilly said yesterday.

This is because only a "handful" of these new bodies fall within her remit under existing legislation, which dates back to 1980 and has not been adequately updated to cover these new agencies. The Ombudsman's role is to investigate complaints from members of the public who feel they have been unfairly treated by certain public bodies.

Publishing her annual report in Dublin, Ms O'Reilly said the "hiving out" of functions to public bodies such as Fás, the Environmental Protection Agency and the Health and Safety Authority has accelerated, leading to an "accountability deficit".

Paradoxically, many of these same bodies are covered under Freedom of Information legislation, she said. "Other accountability mechanisms are also lacking in that they are subject to little or no parliamentary oversight and there has been a diminution in ministerial responsibility and control over functions which formerly were part of the relevant department," she said.

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"The need for legislation to correct this accountability deficit and to allow users of the services of these public bodies to complain to the Ombudsman, is long overdue."

But the proposed Ombudsman Amendment Bill, which aims to address this issue, has so far not been progressed, she said. Ms O'Reilly also highlighted her concern that she is "one of the few ombudsmen in Europe" who cannot investigate the full range of administrative actions in the immigration and residence area.

While her office receives a "small but growing" number of complaints in this area, some of which are "quite harrowing", it can only deal with them on an informal basis.

The report reveals that the Ombudsman received 86 complaints in relation to the Department of Justice, Equality and Law Reform last year, 33 of these relating to the administration of visa or asylum applications.

Ms O'Reilly outlined the case of an asylum seeker who contacted her office because his three-year-old daughter was living in an unsuitable accommodation centre occupied by single adult men. This issue was happily sorted out, she said, but the officials involved could have chosen to ignore the representations of her office, she said.

"Typical complaints [ also] relate to failure to give reasons for refusal of a visa application, or being given only partial reasons," she said. "Complainants rightly point out that this seriously hampers their capacity to mount an effective appeal against the decision. Other decisions are simply arbitrary."

A total of 2,245 valid complaints were received by the Office of the Ombudsman last year, the annual report for 2006 reveals. Almost 40 per cent of these related to the Civil Service, while about 38 per cent referred to local authorities. Most complaints to local authorities related to housing, planning and roads and traffic issues. Five per cent related to An Post.

The Government department with the single most complaints referred to the office last year was Social and Family Affairs, followed by Agriculture and Food and Education and Science.

Almost one in five complaints related to the Health Service Executive, with most referring to the supplementary welfare allowance, the medical card and nursing homes/long-stay care.

A total of 2,187 complaints were addressed in 2006, some of which were carried forward from 2005. Ms O'Reilly said 897 of these complaints, 41 per cent of the total, were fully or partially resolved, meaning these people "were better off as a result of having contacted my office."

"A fundamental question addressed by my office of every complaint received is 'do the administrative actions or inactions complained of amount to maladministration?'," she states in the report. "In arriving at [ these] decisions, public servants cannot operate in a vacuum and they cannot act in an arbitrary fashion."