Éamon Ó Cuív (Galway West, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I want to ask a question, particularly of people working on the ground who have experience. People come to me with a complaint about a hospital or anything. Some are willing to go the long road but my experience is that many people want a quick fix. Complaints processes can take forever. Making a complaint to the Ombudsman takes much longer than it used to. The processes are much more complex. We keep adding to the processes. Most people get worn out by the system. If I might say so, people who are not as digitally involved find it harder to keep with the pace. This is why people from disadvantaged backgrounds often seek the assistance of a TD. It is because we will do the work for them. This might apply to means testing. The first port of call must be to try to eliminate the need for a complaint. This is the easiest solution for everybody.

Are there are ways we could improve the process to make dealing with clearer complaints more summary and quicker to deal with? We had the same thing with the Language Commissioner yesterday, whereby some complaints are easily dealt with and the office informally gets on and tries to resolve the complaint there and then. It is only if it cannot be done that it goes into the long and tortuous process that would wear out anybody. I am especially interested in hearing from the people who work on the ground. How much do we know about people getting worn out by the complaint process itself?