Home > Publications > Selected cases — Parliamentary > Selected Cases and Summaries of Completed Investigations - October 1998 - March 1999 > Welsh Office
Sixth Report Session 1998-99
Volume 2
OCTOBER 1998 - MARCH 1999
The full report of selected cases
Summary of other investigations completed
WELSH OFFICE
Mishandling by the Welsh Office (WO) of documents submitted for use at a medical disciplinary appeal hearing
Mr D appealed to the Secretary of State for Wales against a decision of a Family Health Service Authority that the doctors who had treated his late son had not been in breach of their terms of service. The appeal was heard in March 1992 and adjourned until September. At the reconvened hearing it was claimed that relevant medical records had been tampered with during the adjournment. Although WO, who were responsible for the administrative arrangements for the appeal, had received the documents in question in March, they were unable to account for the documents' whereabouts during the adjournment. Mr D applied to withdraw the appeal and the Secretary of State consented. As a result of Mr D's subsequent pursuit of the matter, in 1995 WO admitted that they had received the documents concerned in March 1992, and they commissioned an independent investigation. It found that the documents had been WO's responsibility during the adjournment but that a lack of adequate procedures for their management had meant that WO had not known where they had been. The Ombudsman strongly criticised WO for failing to keep proper control of the documents, for failing to recognise their fault in September 1992, and for maintaining for three years thereafter a position which proper scrutiny should have revealed to them as untenable. He found that Mr D's application to withdraw the appeal might well have been refused or rescinded had it not been for WO's failure in September 1992 to address their earlier shortcomings, and that Mr D had been put to considerable additional trouble in getting WO to acknowledge the full facts. WO agreed to make an ex gratia payment towards Mr D's appeal costs subject to independent advice about them. They also offered to make Mr D an ex gratia payment of £500 in recognition of their mishandling of his complaints.
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The handling by the Welsh Office Agriculture Department of an application for suckler cow quota
In September 1995 Mr and Mrs G visited the local office of the Welsh Office Agriculture Department to discuss obtaining suckler cow quota and sheep quota as new entrants to farming. According to Mr and Mrs G, having bought a farm, they again visited the local office to collect various application forms, including one for suckler cow quota, which Mrs G completed and delivered back to the local office on 6 December. Mrs G's application for suckler cow premium was rejected because she did not hold a suckler cow quota. The Ombudsman found no corroborative evidence to show that Mr and Mrs G had applied in good time for suckler cow quota; the relevant application forms had not been requisitioned from the printers until 21 December 1995, so an application could not have been made on 6 December. The Permanent Secretary of the Welsh Office apologised for any misleading advice which might have been given to Mr and Mrs G when they had telephoned about the progress of their supposed application.
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