Ombudsman's Principles launch
10 February 2009
Press release 09/01
The Health Service Ombudsman, Ann Abraham, today launched the Ombudsman’s Principles at the Department of Health’s Making Experience Count Conference in London.
Ombudsman’s Principles will be key to supporting NHS officers make a success of the new health complaints system that comes into force from 1 April 2009.
The new complaints system will improve the way health complaints are handled by putting the emphasis on people having their problems and complaints sorted out locally.
It simplifies the process taking out a tier of bureaucracy and enables people whose complaints have not been dealt with properly by their local NHS to complain to the Ombudsman.
At present complainants must complain to the Healthcare Commission before approaching the Ombudsman.
“These three sets of Principles outline the approach we believe the NHS should adopt when delivering good administration and customer service, and how to respond when things go wrong,’ says Ann Abraham.
“They underpin our assessment of performance, our vision of good complaint handling and our approach to putting things right.’
Ends
Notes to editors
- The Ombudsman’s Office receives around 6,000 health enquiries a year under the present three stage health complaints system.
- Under the two stage health complaints system, the Office estimates it will receive an additional 12,000 health enquiries a year.
- It has secured up to £11.2m additional funding for the programme, opening a new office in Manchester and recruiting an extra 110 staff to manage health enquiries.
- The Healthcare Commission will be absorbed by the Care Quality Commission on 31 March 2009.
- The Health Service Ombudsman, Ann Abraham’s March 2005 report ‘Making things better? A report on reform on the NHS complaints procedure in England’ first raised concerns regarding the NHS complaints system.
- The Department of Health’s ‘Our health, our care, our say’ was published in January 2006 to unify and reform the existing complaints arrangements across health and social care followed by the ‘Making experiences count’ consultation paper in June 2007.
- The Health and Social Care Act 2008 introduced the Care Quality Commission to be a new integrated regulator for health and adult social care bringing together existing health and social care regulators into one regulatory body.
- The Ombudsman’s Principles can be found on the publications section of our website www.ombudsman.org.uk or by contacting our Office on 0300 061 4996.
