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You are invited to submit letters to this page on topics appropriate to this website.
The Editor reserves the right to edit or omit letters. The views expressed are not necessarily those of the Editor. Send your letters to: patior@btinternet.com
Failure of the Scottish Public Services Ombudsman to report complaints to the Scottish Parliament.
I would like to bring to your attention some issues regarding the Scottish Public Services Ombudsman (SPSO). I have just recently discovered that the SPSO did not formally investigate or report 641 complaints about their decisions (or as the SPSO like to call them “comeback complaints”) to the Scottish Parliament or public since 2003. The SPSO claimed that they reported all complaints about their service in their annual reports when in fact the opposite was true; the SPSO reported no complaints about their service in all annual reports presented to the Scottish Parliament. The SPSO are not accountable to the Scottish Parliament, Scottish Government or public. The only organisation which can legally investigate the SPSO to determine if they are performing the complaints handling service correctly is Audit Scotland . If you want to know more about the problems with the SPSO then visit the web site www.scottishombudsmanwatch.org
Scottish Ombudsman Watch 30.10.08
A Petition calling on the Scottish Parliament to abolish the Scottish Public Services Ombudsman.
Petition by Jean Mullan calling on the Scottish Parliament to urge the Scottish Government to abolish the Scottish Public Services Ombudsman and replace it with a transparent organisation accountable to the people. 9.8.08
Maintaining professional standards?
Until now, there has been little incentive for professional people to maintain standards. The current complaint procedures are difficult to follow and rarely lead to any real investigation or disciplinary action. How many people have stated after an investigation, it was more like a cover up operation.
Many of these people are in positions where they can basically break the law knowing it is almost impossible for anyone to do anything about it.
Loopholes in the law allow them to get away with things no ordinary citizen could. Professional people deliberately withholding court evidence, or giving false evidence, is something that seems now to be accepted by many courts and solicitors.
Professional people now seem reluctant to accuse fellow professionals of breaking the law. There seems to be a code of conduct similar to honour amongst thieves.
A quote from the ‘Name and Shame Scotland’ website
News of Professor Alice Brown, the Scottish Ombudsman
Professor Alice Brown has just announced that she is going to stand down on the 31st March 2009. This is two years earlier than her term of office.
Maybe all of your complaints to the MSPs, and public petitions have made Professor Brown's job less enjoyable. Two years ago she could dismiss all complaints with impunity and with no adverse publicity!
We hope that the next Ombudsman does what he/she is meant to do, namely hold the authorities to account. Scottish Ombudsman Watch 27.6.08
Mr Hamilton's petition
The petition PE1163 is going before the Scottish Parliament public petitions committee on the 10th June. The petition states:
"Petition by Gregor Hamilton calling on the Scottish Parliament to invite Audit Scotland to conduct, without delay, an economy, efficiency and effectiveness audit of the office of the Scottish Public Services Ombudsman."
Scottish Ombudsman Watch 8.6.08
Mr Hamilton's petition
There is one day left before the closing date on this petition. So far 107 people have signed Mr Hamilton's petition. That is a great result.
Mysteriously the Scottish Parliament web site has removed the discussion section which is a pity as there was a lot of good comments about how the SPSO has failed the public.
The petition is provisionally meant to be going before the committee on the 10th June.
Scottish Ombudsman Watch 31.5.08
Hello,
I have contacted you before, I am case A. To see Case A click here
Nearly thirteen years have passed and I have seen over 40 doctors. I have written to nearly every agency in this country and contacted some very influential people to no avail. I have always disputed my diagnosis and I have shown that errors were made by the Health Board. This was acknowledged by the SPSO. However it was never investigated and the SPSO negotiated with the Health Board to get a second opinion at another hospital. However the doctor was chosen by the doctor that I was complaining about and the second opinion was little more than a paragraph and made in my absence. I also believe that he was not told of the errors.
Because of this second opinion the Health Board refused to look into my illness stating that everything that could be done had been done, but they also stated that one or two clinicians could not be expected to sort the mess out. I persisted. I wrote a further two letters to my G.P. which were ignored so I went down to the surgery with my son. I was told yesterday that I have an enlarged heart, high blood pressure, the electrical impulses to my heart are weak and my lungs could be better. I am shocked and very angry These are symptoms and I am still unaware of the "proper" diagnosis. I am being sent to Cardiology... the very department who wouldn't answer my questions.
Where do I go from here I ask myself. Who is going to take responsibility for this? It is an absolute disgrace.
DS 17.5.08
I am e-mailing you to let you know that Mr Gregor Hamilton has raised a petition calling on the Scottish Parliament to invite Audit Scotland to conduct, without delay, an economy, efficiency and effectiveness audit of the office of the Scottish Public Services Ombudsman
Gregor, like a lot of you, has found that the SPSO failed to investigate properly his complaint and rejected his complaint without valid reasons.
This petition is very important as it would push Audit Scotland towards performing an effectiveness audit on the SPSO which would hopefully identify how badly the SPSO are serving the public.
I would therefore be very grateful if everyone could support this petition by:
1. signing the petition
2. adding a comment supporting the petition and saying how the SPSO treated you
3. contacting your friends and family members and ask them to sign the petition.
The petition can be viewed, signed and discussion comments posted at the web page
http://petitions.pm.gov.uk/LGOandFOI/
To help push Audit Scotland towards auditing the SPSO, I would like to ask the supporters who sent written Submissions in support of Mr Whittet’s petition 1076 if they could forward these written submission to Audit Scotland. If anyone else wants to send a complaint to Audit Scotland about their experiences with the SPSO then this would also help.
Mr Robert Black, Auditor General,
Audit Scotland, 110 George Street, Edinburgh, EH2 4LH
Just a quick email to let you know that petition 1076 regarding the problems with the current Scottish Public Services Ombudsman is now being reviewed by the petitions committee on the 12th February not 19th as initially suggested.
Scottish Ombudsman Watch 11.4.08
“NHS blunders kill 9,000 Scots a year - and cost £23 million in compensation”
Scottish Daily Express 5.2.08 (Also reported in other newspapers)
“I can’t blame people for claiming compensation. Sometimes it is the only way to get their voice heard.”
Mary Scanlon MSP
I would like you all to know that Mr Whittet’s petition was very successful!
Scottish Ombudsman Watch 7.12.07
It was brought to my attention by one of the Scottish Ombudsman Watch Supporters, that a Mr Whittet had submitted the public petition 1076 to the Scottish Parliament due to their failure to properly investigate his complaint.
Scottish Ombudsman Watch 9.11.07
The Scottish Health Campaign Network are meeting with the Health Minister on the 24th September 2007 and one of the subjects is the Ombudsman’s Involvement with Patient (Scottish Patients Association) Complaints.
extract from an email received 1.9.07
No other person should suffer the way I have, I feel the general public is being misled. The SPSO system is not working properly and we, the complainants, seem to have no way of appealing the system or ensuring that we have had a fair hearing, resulting in lack of justice and disenchantment with the system. Things have to change.
J extract from an email received 21.5.07
I am about to write, what could be my last letter, to the SPSO as I feel I may have reached the end of the road with her. However, I have come to learn from two other breast cancer medical negligence cases that they did not consider the SPSO a worthy road to go down. I am now left wondering if by doing this I have jeopardised my case elsewhere. It appears that all the other organisations I have written to are influenced by the Ombudsman's decision not to uphold my case. I will, however, take on some of the suggestions made by the Scottishombudsmanwatch website.
J 22.5.07
An extract from a letter from the SPSO dated 30th January 2007:
“We do not produce formal investigation reports into complaints about our service. I would like to clarify at this point that there is no provision in the Scottish Public Services Ombudsman Act 2002 requiring us to consider complaints about our service.”
Editor’s comment: I am grateful to Scottish Ombudsman Watch for allowing me to see this letter received from the SPSO. It shows that the SPSO is immune from criticism. 1.06.07
www.scottishombudsmanwatch.org
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