Examination of Witnesses (Questions 40-52)
DR JANE
MARTIN
12 OCTOBER 2009
Q40 John Cummings: Yes.
Dr Martin: No. I know a lot of
people who have worked in local authorities and I regard their
professional integrity very highly.
Q41 Mr Betts: Just in terms of your
experience, you are saying you are one step removed from being
a local government officer and being able to perceive maybe the
consumer's point of view but, on the other hand, the fact that
you have not got any particular experience, say of planning and
housing where a lot of the complaints going to the Ombudsman Service
are in those areas, do you think that is a particular weakness?
Dr Martin: No, I do not. I draw
to your attention that I have two research degrees where I have
honed very finely my skills to ensure that evidence gathering
methodologies are appropriate. I am used to handling evidence,
I am used to analysing evidence and bringing intellectual rigour
to bear. You are right to point out that I have not worked in
particular in a housing role but I am very confident that I can
pick up a brief and make sure that I have the appropriate technical
information should I require it.
Q42 Sir Paul Beresford: The response
to that would be that you are academic, you have not actually
done it, you have not had your hands dirty and you have not been
at the front.
Dr Martin: I would regard myself
as an academic but also as a manager and a practitioner, so I
hope that I would be able to straddle both areas.
Q43 Sir Paul Beresford: How will
you deal with a vexatious complainant?
Dr Martin: With care and consideration.
I think the important thing as Ombudsman is to treat all complainants
fairly. I am very conscious that a vexatious complainant can take
up a lot of energy and can be seen to be dominant in terms of
taking the attention of the Ombudsman. One of the pieces of work
that I did as an academic was to look at the way in which so-called
"angry parents" work with schools and I found that the
most important thing was for the school to be more dispassionate
about the complainant and to make sure that you focus on the facts
of the case, and that is what I would do with a vexatious complainant.
Q44 Mr Betts: Can I just ask about
job satisfaction. I think people tend to do a job better when
they actually enjoy doing it. In your past roles, whether it has
been academic research or other jobs you have had, regulation
and the other units you have worked in, to some extent you have
been able to set the agenda there and you had some control over
what you did, trying to influence things, trying to take things
in a certain direction, but this job is not like that, is it,
you are sat there waiting for someone to complain about somebody
else's mistake and you are not in charge of any agenda, you are
totally reactive. Is that going to give you job satisfaction?
Dr Martin: Whilst what you describe
is certainly the case I am also looking forward very much to being
Vice-Chair of the Local Commission and working with my colleagues
to shape the way in which the service is delivered. Whilst I do
not for one minute minimise the important role of Ombudsman, as
you have put it, in waiting for the next complaint and dealing
with it, I regard the role as being much broader than that. In
any event, I am really very pleased indeed to have the opportunity
to take on what I believe to be a substantial public role. I have
been a supporter of, interested in and somebody who as a practitioner
has exalted public service organisations over my career to be
very, very alive to the issues of public accountability and I
regard it as a privilege to have the opportunity to be selected
for this role.
Q45 Chair: Can we just turn to some
of the criticisms that there have been of the Ombudsman Service,
in particular criticisms that it has been a "toothless tiger".
Do you think it needs greater powers? In particular, do you think
it should be able to order councils to comply with its recommendations
within a certain timescale, for example?
Dr Martin: I refer you in part
to the answer I gave earlier which is to highlight the point that
the Ombudsman Service is about dispute resolution. What I have
found interesting in my current role in working for the Local
Better Regulation Office and working with local authority inspectors
who are enforcing regulation and one of the things that has become
clear to me in that role is that the opportunity to enforce, to
prosecute if you like, to require compliance is not necessarily
the most important tool in the armoury, if I can put it that way.
What is most important is to be able to be proactive in advising
and supporting best practice and compliance with good practice
in administration. From what I understand so far the Ombudsman
Service has a very high level of compliance with its recommendations
on behalf of local authorities. I am not sure at this stage from
what I know that I would necessarily agree with your description
of it being a "toothless tiger".
Q46 Chair: Do you think there is
a greater role for the Ombudsman in checking up maybe a year down
the line whether the recommendations have really made a difference?
Dr Martin: Certainly I think that
would be a very helpful thing to do. As any mechanism of public
accountability as part of the regulatory machinery of government,
if I can put it that way, the Ombudsman is only one tool and I
know that the Ombudsman Service increasingly works with regulatory
bodies and the more that we could make sure there is an effective
feedback loop, if I can put it that way, so that the greater lessons
learnt from the work of the Ombudsman support best practice, I
think that would be an improvement. I would like to look at that
as one of the first things if I take up the role.
Q47 Chair: Would that include greater
feedback to the complainant? For example, if there were recommendations
the complainant would be told that there were those recommendations
but they too would not know whether the council had actually really
acted on them.
Dr Martin: Absolutely. That is
a most important fundamental point with any interaction or involvement
of the public with local government or other public agencies at
the local level. It is very important indeed that local people
do get the feedback and see that not only have they had redress
for a particular complaint but that is feeding into future practice,
process and, indeed, culture of organisations.
Q48 Sir Paul Beresford: What do you
do if you have had a full inquiry, full investigation, you support
the complainant, it is a clear case and you write and explain
this to the local government concerned and they throw it out?
Dr Martin: I understand that it
is the practice of the Ombudsman certainly to make that public
if that is the case and in many cases there is nothing like the
oxygen of publicity perhaps to bring influence to bear. I think
that is a good thing. I do take on board the point you are making
and it is absolutely essential that future practice is influenced
by the recommendations of the Ombudsman.
Q49 Sir Paul Beresford: Do you take
the Government's report, and I am thinking of the Equitable Life
report, and send in a second report?
Dr Martin: The other thing that
perhaps we could look at is the way in which we tie up and align
the Ombudsman work perhaps with other forms of accountability,
for example the scrutiny function of the local authority, which
you may know I have had a lot of dealings with. We have a consultative
White Paper at the moment, do we not, looking at the way in which
the scrutiny function might be expanded. It is just possible,
is it not, that there may be some tie-ups we can make there to
ensure that the internal scrutiny within the authority is adequately
taking forward the recommendations of the Ombudsman.
Q50 Alison Seabeck: At the moment
the Ombudsman's decisions can only be challenged in court. For
a member of the public who is dissatisfied with a decision that
may be a step too far, despite the fact that they may feel natural
justice is not being done. Do you think there should be alternative
options or do you think the court route is the right route?
Dr Martin: I recognise the point
you are making that sometimes for members of the public that does
seem to be a step too far, however it is consistent with other
similar forums. The main point for the public surely is to make
sure the forms of redress and public accountability are very clear-cut
and simple and easy to understand. The more we can avoid complexity
in the system then I think that has got to be a good thing.
Q51 Alison Seabeck: Should you be
avoiding incestuousness in the system, if you like, in that if
a member of the public felt something was not done fairly or reasonably
by a particular member of your staff or team that complaint would
be investigated internally at the moment, would it not?
Dr Martin: Yes.
Q52 Alison Seabeck: Are you comfortable
with that because I know you have some strong feelings about accountability
and have made that very clear?
Dr Martin: Yes, I take your point
and I can see that there would be some merit perhaps in having
some further external scrutiny of the Ombudsman Service. At the
moment the Ombudsman Service is accountable to Parliament through
this Committee and there may be ways in which we could improve
that in the future.
Chair: Any further questions that Members
have got? No. Thank you very much, Dr Martin.
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