Mr. Peter Tyndall:

Thank you, Chairman. It is always good to engage with the committee. As you said, this is one of many occasions when I have had the opportunity to do so.

The relationship between the Ombudsman and the Parliament through committees is very important, as it ensures there is oversight of the public services within my jurisdiction and, particularly, that there is an opportunity to deal with any recommendations that may not be accepted. However, I am delighted to say, as I come close to the end of my term of office and following the work of my distinguished predecessors, that for more than 30 years all recommendations made by my office have been accepted. That is testament to the quality and effectiveness of the relationship with the committee. I was asked in a radio interview during the week whether people were concerned about my office and if they were afraid of it. I did not want to say that people are afraid of my office as, in general, we have very good working relationships, but I did say that where people were thinking about not implementing recommendations, telling them they might have to account for that to this committee usually has a salutary effect and persuades them to change their minds. I think they are afraid of the committee rather than of me.

I wish to open my remarks by saying that, as the Ombudsman, you see the failures of public service. Often, people come to the Ombudsman because they are unhappy, but I am very conscious of the quality of the public services in Ireland in general and of the quality of the people who deliver them. I wish to start by paying tribute to all the staff and leaders of public services throughout the country for their dedication, expertise and commitment. This has never been more evident than during the pandemic. I also take the opportunity of my final appearance before the committee to pay tribute to my staff for their work. The range of work across the office is very extensive and I have been very well served, so I am grateful to them for all their efforts.

We are here, largely, to examine the annual report from my office. The agenda lists three, but I will concentrate on last year. As the members know, 2020 was not a typical year. We had to deal with the pandemic. We had not long moved into our new offices on Earlsfort Terrace and had hardly arrived before we had to move out again, but we were able to get services up and running very quickly and almost seamlessly. Our systems enabled us to work remotely, as others have done. The annual report is titled "Managing complaints in a pandemic" because that was the context in which we worked during the year.

The number of complaints to my office was slightly down. We had high numbers of inquiries. The reduction in the number of complaints was from a high in 2019 but was mostly related to the fact we were not able to undertake our usual outreach. That had an impact. A particular impact, considering conversations I have had with the committee previously, was in direct provision. As the committee knows, the majority of our complaints come from our visits to the centres. I am pleased we are about to recommence visiting the centres now. That is not to say we had no complaints, but that the levels were lower than we would have expected.

We did receive some new types of complaints arising from the pandemic, such as complaints about the new pandemic unemployment payment, PUP. Most of the complaints about the PUP were about arrears of payments to applicants, simply delays in getting money out to people. When we looked at it and the scale of what had been undertaken by the Department of Social Protection, we did not find any systemic issues. It was a remarkable achievement to put the system in place in the time in which it was done. We found individual cases and I illustrated one of those in the annual report. It involved an entertainer resident in Ireland but working overseas. Her PUP payment was first granted and then stopped. When we looked at it, we could see there was nothing in the scheme that prevented her from benefiting from it as she was resident and paying tax in Ireland. That was typical of a small number of cases where we got decisions reversed. Generally, the scheme was well managed and it was remarkable how quickly it was put in place.

This week, along with Ms Hanrahan, I have been engaged in outreach, this time virtually, in Wexford, Carlow and Kilkenny. That is part of a programme of outreach visits the office does. A case that was especially relevant there was the very sad one of a woman who was given drugs for alcohol withdrawal when, in fact, she had not had a drink for ten years and was dying with liver cancer. The impact of that was that the drugs caused her to be drowsy and her family were unable to engage properly with her in her final days. We brought about major changes there, partly because it was impossible for the hospital to identify who had actually prescribed the drugs. That revealed systemic problems in the way its systems were recording medical interventions. That has been changed since.

I have spoken to the committee at some length about the Wasted Lives report. The critical thing I wish to say at this point is that we are very heavily engaged with the HSE and the Department on the implementation of the report. I was delighted when the Government committed to implement the recommendations. The important thing now is to ensure it is done in an expeditious fashion. I hope the committee will also keep those recommendations in review to ensure the momentum is not lost and the commitments are delivered. People have waited a long time for action and I hope it will happen quickly.

An issue that concerns me greatly is access to transport for people living with a disability. Ms Emily O'Reilly produced a report on this in which she indicated that the schemes in existence then did not comply with equality legislation. There has still not been a replacement for those schemes. Many members will know about the inadequacy of the current disabled drivers and passengers scheme. I have raised this issue time and again. What is really instructive is that so many Members of the Oireachtas, including members of the Government, have complained to my office about the way the scheme discriminates between people with a disability. This scheme provides for a tax reduction in respect of acquiring a vehicle adapted for disability. The consequence of all this is that, before I finish, I intend to issue a report setting out my concerns about the lack of access to transport for disabled people. It is a serious matter.

There has been a suggestion they can catch a bus or get a train. Anybody who follows Twitter will be very well aware that the lifts on the DART almost inevitably do not work. However, if you are living in rural Ireland and you are waiting for a bus or a train to come to your isolated home, you will be waiting for a very long time indeed. I hope that argument will not be advanced again. It is very important we do something because people get very isolated if they do not have access to transport and a way to get out and about and engage with their communities. It affects disabled people who want to work and cannot.

I wish to refer to some issues that were mentioned by you, Chairman, in your very generous introduction. I was wondering how I found the time for all that myself. I will pick up on the issues regarding jurisdiction. There has been a commitment to provide jurisdiction in respect of clinical judgment, in respect of prisons and in respect of the administration of the asylum and immigration process. All those commitments are welcome. We have seen fair progress on the prison complaints, although it has taken an eternity and must be brought to a conclusion.

The other issues are moving but they are moving glacially. We could do with more progress on both of those matters in the not too distant future.

The Acting Chairman mentioned the role I played as president of the International Ombudsman Institute. One of the things that happened with that was the Venice Commission developed the Venice principles. I was glad to have an opportunity to input into that process and that they were adopted as the global standards for ombudsman institutions worldwide in December 2020 by the United Nations General Assembly with co-sponsorship by Ireland, which I was pleased to see. For my successor, there is an opportunity to review the legislation. It was amended in 2012 but the fundamental legislation dates back to 1980. The time is right to review it and replace it with something more modern and fit for purpose, which is consistent with the Venice principles. The Venice Commission has agreed to review legislation where requested to do so. That would be a useful first step in moving it forward and something my successor might well want to take on board. I hope the committee would participate in and perhaps sponsor any such review.

Before coming to this meeting, I thought back to my first engagement with the predecessor of the committee when I was appointed in 2013. I said at the time and I have always said since that trying to resolve issues in a non-adversarial way, being fair to everyone and looking to drive improvement and learning more broadly in the system would be my approach. In general I sought to fix things, rather than complain about them. The Acting Chairman mentioned some of the major reports that have been prepared. I hope they had an impact on securing improvements in public services.

I thank the members of the committee for their support over the past eight years. The role of the Ombudsman is an intrinsic component of the checks and balances within any well-functioning democracy. That relationship with the committee has been important. The committee will not be rid of me quite as early as may have been thought. I have agreed to remain in my post until the end of the year because of delays in the recruitment process. There should not be a long gap before my successor is appointed. I thank members for their attention.