The question is:
What are the risks in referring a complaint to the SPSO ???
There are several risks. Noted that the SPSO procedures fail to meet some of the most basic Human Rights:
- Unlike a court of law where all information, data, and documents are seen by both sides, who both have the obligation to provide to the other party any such data, information, and documents which might assist that party in the case, the SPSO does NOT enable this basic human right.
- There is no sensible or usable appeals procedure. The only way to reverse a judgement is by Judicial Review at enormous cost - usually over £200,000. However such a review can only alter the judgement if it errs on a point of law.
- The facts are determined by the SPSO. Their staff are de facto "pro" the Body being complained of.
- The staff are just "plods off the street". Occasionally an "expert" will be called in. You are not allowed to request your own expert witness. to review these cases.
- The sad statistic is that far too many cases are wrongly decided. The author took a council to a tribunal and won. Then the same case was taken to the SPSO who provided a totally different answer. This was just to demonstrate that the SPSO was incompetent. The author is a Chartered Engineer [who also belonged to the Chartered Institute of Arbitrators]. The SPSO findings on Water Charges are reviewed on this web site. However, the SPSO still REFUSES to review these errors and mistakes.
A more complete list was compiled and published by the now defunct http://ombudsmanwatchers.org.uk/ web site. It is however still available here:
https://web.archive.org/web/20111016000540/http://ombudsmanwatchers.org.uk/
To see the list of the Fifteen Pillars of Justice in a paralell format please click here.
Accountability Scotland raised a petition regarding the effectiveness of the SPSO. Please see here.
The Citizen Participation and Public Petitions committee reviewed this on 15th May 2024. Please see here for the Accountability Scotland version of the transcript.
Fergus Ewing MSP, a member of the committee, said at the meeting:
"I no longer recommend to any constituents that they go to the SPSO because first, those who go to the SPSO do not get anywhere; secondly they do not get a result; and thirdly, they often end up even more fed up than they were in the first place because they feel that the whole process is, frankly, pointless."
This echos the result stated above.
In fact another MSP, Bob Doris supported the petition with the following words [please scroll down to the last additional submission]:
In the first instance the Scottish Government reply lacked clarity in one aspect. Whist it was clear that resource implications will mean there is unlikely to be a review in the near future, the Scottish Government did not engage with what I would consider the underlying matter to be, that is - is there value in having a review of the SPSO 20 years on?
and:
However I am not convinced there is a robust and effective process by which individuals, who believe the SPSO has erred in its conclusions, can have a meaningful review of SPSOs decisions. I would include the Independent Customer Service Complaints Reviewer in that regard.
Again this echos the conclusion stated above.