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Speech at the Launch of the Diploma in Management of Modern Public Service Delivery (20.06.2006)

Address by Emily O'Reilly, Ombudsman and Information Commissioner at at the Institute of Public Administration

It is with great pleasure that I join you today at your seminar on putting the customer at the centre of public service delivery. I've been invited to launch the IPA's new Diploma in the Management of Public Service Delivery. Disappointingly, instead of smashing a bottle of champagne in order to so do, I've been asked instead to speak to you briefly on the challenges facing public sector managers in creating more customer-orientated services.

A brief personal reflection first before I get to my more public role. Twenty years ago, the thought of creating a diploma course as sophisticated as this one would not have entered too many people's heads. In those days, the people - and I speak in broad generalisations here - had little expectation of a customer service approach to their complaints or even their straightforward queries about services. Getting a telephone answered was an achievement; getting a telephone answered by someone who could actually assist with the particular complaint or query was an achievement of Olympian standards.

We have undoubtedly moved on, but many of us in recent years will have encountered a new impediment to having our public service demands met and that is - curiously - IT. Information Technology has revolutionised all of our lives. No other invention or development can match that of the internet in our recent history and many of us wonder at how we managed to operated our lives without it before. Yet, the same technology - as used by certain service providers both public and private - is also being used, perhaps inadvertently to fend the customer off, to protect the company or public body's own interest and to downplay and cast aside the human element in service transactions to the great detriment of a real quality service.

It is indeed wonderful to book your flight, even your seat number on the internet. But it is frustrating beyond belief to attempt to track someone down who can help you when your request or problem does not neatly match the software. Two years ago, I spent over five hours trying to chase a credit card query with an airline. At one point I seriously thought that I would have to get into my car and drive to the airport to find someone who could help.

Similarly, the Revenue's on-line service is a model of progressive thinking, yet my office is getting the occasional complaint about difficulties in making telephone contact with the same service. I also have to remind myself, when I speak about the Office of the Ombudsman that many, many people do not have access to the web, and that talking up my new improved website will have relevance to just a limited number of people. So I would ask you all, as this new venture begins, to remember not to be in thrall to technology and to remember that the customer is a living, breathing human voice who just occasionally would like to talk to another one.

As Ombudsman, I deal with complaints. I report on those which I uphold and which I feel may have some lessons both for the organisation concerned and for the wider public service. Inevitably, therefore, it is my criticisms of administrative failings which attract attention and which sometimes result in my Office being blamed for being "negative". In one recent such example, I was startled to find that it was the Office of the Ombudsman which was being blamed for the A&E crisis because we had highlighted the entitlements of the elderly to long-stay care. As a former journalist, however, I'm used to such "shoot the messenger" reactions and I find that a sense of humour frequently helps to quell my first indignant response. I see the public service from a unique standpoint - that of the dissatisfied citizen, client or customer who has had the stamina to pursue their case initially with the public body concerned and who then comes to me. I do not claim that I deal with a representative sample of public service customers, but it should be obvious that there is much to be learned from the experience of these people as to how the service to the public may be improved.

One of the main aims of the public service modernisation programme over the last decade has been to improve the quality of public services. As part of this effort, we've seen a plethora of customer service action plans and customer service charters. I fear that in many cases these laminated and expensively produced documents have amounted to no more than lip service to the modernisation agenda. These service charters are to be lived by and not just laminated, as an Ombudsman colleague of mine is fond of saying. The level of success in implementation of these customer service initiatives has varied considerably across public sector organisations.

There have been many successes - notably the Revenue Commissioners, the Department of Social and Family Affairs, the Passport Office, the Department of Agriculture and Food and the Motor Taxation Department of Dublin City Council - to name, but some of those who have dealt innovatively and efficiently with large volume transactions involving the public. There have also been some excellent examples at local level - for example the one-stop shop initiative in County Donegal sponsored by Donegal County Council which joins up the services provided by a range of public bodies.

In a recent report to the Health Service Executive, I reviewed my Office's experience of dealing with complaints in the public health sector and made a number of suggestions to the HSE on how to improve the quality of health service delivery. I think the most important feature of that report is "The Ombudsman's Statement of Good Practice for the Public Health Service in dealing with Patients" in which I try to assist the HSE and the hospitals to become more patient-focused in their service delivery. The Statement deals with human rights and health care. I identify 5 basic rights of patients:

- the right to be respected as a human being;

- the right to have physical and mental integrity respected;

- the right to security of the person;

- the right to have privacy respected; and

- the right to have moral and cultural values, including religious and philosophical convictions, respected.

The Statement goes on to deal with such aspects as the right to information and it deals with the vitally important issues of consent, confidentiality, quality of care and treatment, patient safety and dignity. I am happy to say that the HSE has welcomed the report and has stated that it is anxious to listen and learn from complaints and incidents and improve its communications and quality processes.

The HSE intends to develop a single policy for the management of complaints following consultation with users of the service, staff, trade union officials and management. The HSE says that this policy will guide it in good complaints handling and ensure that the rights of patients, consumers and staff are upheld in a culture that is built on fairness and trust. One of the other issues dealt with in my report was the importance of records management; I understand that there is work in progress to improve the management of medical records. I will await developments in each of these areas with much interest.

One the major difficulties faced both by my Office and by the citizen in dealing with the public service is the range and complexity of the service itself. For example, a recent TASC publication - "Outsourcing Government: Public Bodies and Accountability" - identified some 482 executive agencies, advisory bodies and task forces up to half of which have come into being in the past ten years. This so-called "agentisation" has happened without any due regard for proper accountability mechanisms - many are outside my remit as Ombudsman and Information Commissioner.

What then, should a truly modernised and effective public service look like? Drawing on my experience both as Ombudsman and Information Commissioner, I believe that the public service should be a microcosm of the principles which ought to characterise a modern and effective democratic State. Public service bodies should be held accountable by enabling and encouraging "customers" or members of the public to be vigilant in three ways:

- There must be transparency in the decision-making process with public bodies. The public can only begin to understand and trust public bodies if they can follow their actions and gain access to their documents.

- Public bodies must have written criteria or principles of good administration to guide them in their work. The public must know the "rules of the game" if they are to begin to question the actions of public bodies.

- Finally, members of the public must be able to challenge the decisions of public bodies, either through alternative dispute resolution mechanisms or, as a last resort, through the courts.

How does the Irish Public Service measure up under these three headings? In relation to transparency, we have a freedom of information regime, albeit one which has seen public take-up excessively curtailed by imposition of up-front fees. The FOI Act does not apply to, for example, the Gardai or to a wide range of state agencies - just two examples might be the VEC's and the Adoption Board. Although I understand that it is proposed that the VEC's will be made subject to FOI in the future. Even where the FOI Act does apply, information has been denied to the public, often in order to protect sectional interests - information about the performance of schools is a prominent example. Also under the transparency heading, some public bodies seem to be retreating from dealing personally with the public. Reliance on Internet services and call centres may be advances, but have some public bodies - and I've mentioned the Revenue Commissioners before in this context - gone too far in this area? I am aware of several PAYE taxpayers who happen not to be computer literate and who have found it almost impossible to speak by phone to a relevant official.

On the second point, the public must be aware of the rules of the game. There is a Code of Standards and Behaviour for the civil service and a Code of Conduct for Local Authority Employees. In general, the public do not know about these codes and not enough has been done to publicise them. The principles in the codes are also couched in general terms and little or nothing has been done to explain them or to emphasise their relevance to daily work situations. Another example of laminating, perhaps?

The third point deals with the facilities available to the public to challenge decisions of public bodies. Many government departments and offices and local authorities have non-statutory complaints systems in place. Some systems are statutory and of long standing, but complaints systems are less common on the fringes of the public service - for example in state agencies. While the Health Act 2004 finally made provision for a statutory complaints system, this has not yet been brought into effect. I find it extraordinary that some 12 years of a modernisation programme elapsed before the establishment of a complaints system for a service which affects the health and well-being of so many people. Equally, where a complaint is justified, redress may not be offered. In 2003, my predecessor Kevin Murphy spoke at a major conference in Dublin Castle on the quality customer service initiative. He criticised the revised QCS principles launched in 2000 for failing to mention redress and noted that the original 1997 QCS principles had included a redress heading and a commitment to introduce a formalised system for customers dissatisfied with decisions. He wondered why redress had been deleted from the revised version. As a result of his comments, the Department of the Taoiseach undertook to come up with proposals for redress, which are still awaited.

There is an urgent need to tackle the redress question; from the giving of apologies, right across the spectrum of possible redress measures to the granting of compensation, public bodies are highly reluctant to engage with complainants on this issue. In my experience, most complainants are interested in just three things - an explanation for what went wrong, an apology and an assurance that matters have been put right so that the same thing will not happen to other people.

I acknowledge that the environment in which public servants work today if highly complex and actually more complex in many instances than the private sector. The Diploma being launched today is about enhancing public servants' skills to deal with that complexity and to help implement a public service that is, as the well-worn slogan does "just what it says on the tin". May I wish the IPA and its students every success in this venture.

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