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Summaries of some of the latest issues in the news from the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman's Office
Equitable Life
Continuing care
Occupational pensions investigation report
The Code of Practice for Victims of Crime (the Victims’ Code)
The Ombudsman has written to Members of Parliament to provide a progress update on her investigation into the prudential regulation of the Equitable Life Assurance Society. Read it here. (PDF 511kb)
Equitable Life, April 2008The Ombudsman wrote to Members of Parliament to provide an update on her investigation.
Read it here (pdf 511kb)
Equitable Life, December 2007
The Ombudsman wrote to Members of Parliament to provide an update on her investigation.
Read it here (pdf 601kb)
Equitable Life, May 2007
The Ombudsman wrote to Members of Parliament to provide an update on her investigation.
Read it here (pdf 577kb)
Equitable Life, October 2006
The Ombudsman wrote to Members of Parliament to provide an update on her investigation.
Read it here (Word 570kb).
Equitable Life, February 2006
The Ombudsman wrote to Members of Parliament to provide an update on her investigation.
Read it here (Word 720kb).
August 2007
In Retrospective continuing care funding and redress HC 386 published on 14 March 2007, the Ombudsman, Ann Abraham, reports on maladministration in the Department of Health's decision making and communication of its approach to recompense for wrongly denied funding for the continuing care of elderly and disabled people.
This is Ms Abraham’s third report on continuing care.
In the first, NHS funding for long term care HC 399, published on 20 February 2003, she highlighted problems with the application of local eligibility criteria and with the NHS national guidance framework. This had resulted in some people wrongly being denied funding and some paying for care themselves. Many more people than had been expected subsequently claimed retrospective funding in response to the report. Complaints about delays in decisions and lack of clarity about eligibility led to her second report, NHS funding for long term care: follow-up report HC 144 on 16 December 2004.
Implementing Ms Abraham’s recommendation in this third report, the Department of Health issued its National Framework for NHS Continuing Healthcare (link opens in new window) in June 2007.
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The Ombudsman’s investigation into the actions of the Department for Work and Pensions, the Treasury, the former Occupational Pensions Regulatory Authority and the National Insurance Contributions Office in relation to the security of final salary occupational pensions.
The 254-page report says that the investigation uncovered evidence of real suffering, distress and uncertainty about the future among pension scheme members and their families, who had relied on government information when making choices about their future pension provision.
Press release
28 June 2006
The Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman, Ann Abraham, is appearing before the Public Administration Select Committee this afternoon in relation to our report Trusting in the pensions promise: government bodies and the security of final salary occupational pensions.
The Ombudsman's memorandum and its accompanying annexes which includes her concerns about the wider implications of the Government's response and important statements about the role of the Ombudsman can be found here.
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The Victims’ Code, which was launched by the Government on 3 April 2006, brought with it a statutory entitlement for victims of crime to a minimum standard of service from criminal justice agencies. The Parliamentary Ombudsman is the final arbiter of complaints from victims who believe they have not received the service to which they are entitled and have been unable to get their complaint resolved satisfactorily directly with the agency concerned. If you are a victim of crime and have a complaint, under the Code, that you would like the Ombudsman to consider you can access here our leaflet for victims entitled: The Victims’ Code – How to complain (PDF 823kb). Bengali, Punjabi, Urdu, Gujerati, Arabic, Chinese and Welsh language versions are available here
 Download the order form for the Victims' code: How to complain leaflet (pdf 40kb)
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