Ombudsman Services:Property / Livewell Southwest Ltd: "A" is for, "Appropriate" "Asphyxiating" and "Abuse." (692)

To the Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy Secretary / Chair of Ombudsman Services / CEO and Chief Ombudsman of Ombudsman Services and Chair of The Ombudsman Association / Health Secretary/ CEO of Livewell Southwest Ltd.

For Clarity - Attempt 692.

692. Ombudsman Services:Property / Livewell Southwest Ltd: "A" is for "Appropriate," "Asphyxiating" and "Abuse." 

Dear Mr Clark, Lord Tim Clement Jones, The Rev Shand Smith, Mr Hunt and Professor Waite,

It seems that at long last it is now no longer appropriate for those working in government; to use sexist and homophobic language, to lunge drunkenly at female parliamentary staff in lifts, corridors and where it takes their fancy or for ministers to require their secretaries to purchase sex toys on their behalf. It has taken until October 2017 for such breathtakingly inappropriate behaviours to be considered an abuse of power and position.

Basic requirements for an healthy modern 21st century democracy such as; the establishment of trust, determining and maintaining acceptable standards of accountability and transparency have until yesterday been conspicuously absent.

Getting these issues onto the agenda and openly debated has proven to be an uphill struggle. To expect to have them enshrined in enforceable law in a post-Brexit Britain in which many on the right of the political spectrum are seeking to abolish the Human Rights Act, seems to be overly optimistic.

The status quo has proven remarkably resilient to modernisation and reform. It looks set to remain that way.  

Part of that status quo and new world order are Ombudsmen and with ombudsmen come ombudsman schemes and what they - ombudsmen - determine between themselves to be, "civil justice."

Sitting in judgement of the ombudsman in our case was the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman who eventually threatened to prosecute us.  We consider that to also be a breathtakingly inappropriate abuse of power. 

Q. Mr Clark, why is it appropriate for government monitors to continue approving a redress scheme in which complainants are handed decisions that are not arrived at in a logical manner? Is this not an abuse of power?

An obvious solution would be for the outcome of cases to be placed online with reasons given for the ombudsman's decision and for complainants to be offered the opportunity to say whether they were satisfied with it or not. 

Q Lord Tim Clement Jones, is it appropriate to have an Ombudsman who is a member of the professional body he is investigating, investigate complaints about his colleagues when this is forbidden in your company's Terms of Reference, the ones that were approved by the OFT? Is this not an abuse of power?

The solution to that would appear to be to abide by the Terms of Reference and employ an ombudsman who isn't a member of RICS.

Q. The Rev Shand Smith, to preside over the removal of the requirement for all participating ombudsman schemes affiliated to The Ombudsman Association to have a Whistleblowing Policy, removes a key area of transparency and accountability. Is this appropriate? 

Here the simple solution would appear to be to reinstate the Whistleblowing Policy as a requirement for membership.

Monidipa Fouzder in, "NHS whistleblower protection won't allay fears" says,

"London firm Bindmans said the Department of Health's proposals outlined in its, 'Protecting whistleblowers seeking jobs in the NHS' consultation, are nothing more than regulation, 'tweaks.'

  Jeremy Hunt said the regulations will ensure staff, 'feel they are protected with the law on their side.'

  However, Bindmans associate, Peter Daly, said the proposals continue to treat whistleblowers as potential litigants rather than medical professionals fulfilling their medical and professional duties by raising concerns to benefit the public.

  Daly added: 'Under the proposals, it appears that whistleblowers must first wait to suffer often irreparable damage to their career and livelihood, then commence litigation against the NHS, then prove to a judge the treatment they received was unlawful, before receiving any formal recognition of the validity of the concerns they had initially raised.

  This does not appear to address the continued existence of the asphyxiating environment deterring those with concerns to raise.'"

(www.lawgazette.co.uk/law/nhs-whistleblower-protections)

 

Q. Mr Hunt, private alternative dispute resolution offers no whistleblower protection to its employees and the NHS very little. Is this not an abuse of power?

End this abuse of power by giving Whistleblowers full and meaningful protection both legally and financially. Their salaries should be protected until they find new employment should that be necessary.

Q. Professor Waite, is it appropriate to have Anonymous Desk Top Reviewers writing one line sentences that sum up a dead patient's complex medical history and then presenting their grieving families with huge bills for nursing care when the decision was wrong in the first place?

Make it a legal requirement for every decision made by a health care professional to be documented and signed by that person so as to end the scandalous practice of anonymous individuals making appalling decisions and passing the cost of their criminal incompetence on to their patients.

Q. Professor Waite, why are you protecting the identity of those individuals responsible for such appalling decisions and is this not an abuse of power?

This must be made illegal.

Q. Professor Waite, shouldn't a professional health carer's duty always be to their patient and not to a system that is deliberately set out to rob those patients of everything they ever worked for. Is this not a total abuse of power, grossly abusive and breaththtakingly inappropriate?

Scrap the truly inhumane, corrupt and barbaric National Framework For NHS Healthcare And NHS-Funded Nursing Care, a blatantly rigged extortion racket deliberately designed to rob the sick, the elderly, the dying and the dead of everything they lived and worked for.

Here are two asphyxiating market environments; the market in private justice and an increasingly marketised and privatised National Health Service, where decisions (which are often eye-wateringly ludicrous and invariably involve substantial sums of money) are left free to flourish with the most minimal transparency and accountability.

Otherwise things would be very, very different.

This good for business but bad for the people and for democracy.

Yours sincerely,

Steve Gilbert - Workstock Number - 510458.

The Ombudsmans61percent Campaign is at: www.blogger.com and www.facebook.com - Ombudsmans Sixtyone-percent.