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An Ombudsman System with Hong Kong Characteristics Our new animated TV Announcement in Public Interest has introduced the characters of "Ombuddies" to promote the concept of ombudsmanship. Today's Ombudsman is not someone who growls or orders people around. Instead the approach is non-adversarial and is through explanation, discussion and persuasion to achieve results. Social justice and reasonableness is encompassed in the redress system of my Office because we always try to negotiate and arrive at an amicable settlement without apportioning blame and without leaving bitter feelings among those involved in the complaint being investigated. Unlike the court system which is full of sanctions even in civil matters, my Office is there to promote better understanding of human relationship in every sphere of life. When I took up the Office of The Ombudsman four years ago, I have committed to a mission of serving the people of Hong Kong by redressing grievances and addressing issues arising from maladministration in the public sector, and through independent, objective and impartial investigations, to bring about improvements in the quality and standard of and promote fairness in the public administration. The "Ombuddies" are now being featured in most of our promotional, educational and publicity programmes aiming at enhancing public awareness and understanding of our services as well as to tell the people of Hong Kong the many roles of an Ombudsman. They are -
Since the introduction of direct access to my Office in 1994 and the extension of The Ombudsman's jurisdiction to cover major statutory bodies, my Office has experienced a rising trend of complaints. One of the factors that contributes to such a trend is the increasing expectation of the public towards an open, fair and accountable public administration as the public have come to know more about the operation of the public sector and their rights through the performance pledges and complaint procedures published by government departments and statutory bodies. Perhaps as a result of this, there has emerged a public less tolerant of poor service and more ready to complain. Having dealt with over 8,000 complaints in the past four years, my Office has accumulated substantial experience and expertise in the resolution of disputes. In so doing, my Office gives the people aggrieved by actions of the public service in Hong Kong the capacity to question the authority and to seek redress. In addition to these investigations, my Office has conducted 15 direct investigations with the intention to eliminating what might be termed the root causes of many of the complaints encountered. Our recommendations, totalling some 1,400, have helped to improve the standard of public administration by identifying the underlying causes of the problems and suggesting improvements. We have also advised departments and statutory bodies in our recommendations on risk management matters. We are now conducting studies with similar aims on housing and prison complaints which constitute the bulk of complaints we received. The results of our studies will be published in my next Annual Report. Resolution of complaints lodged with this Office is dealt with by way of investigation, rendering assistance/clarification and the Internal Complaint Handling Programme. Since April 1997, my Office has launched the mediation service as another alternative dispute resolution method with the hope of reinforcing societal cohesion and fostering understanding between the disputing parties. So far we have completed 5 successful mediations involving the Post Office, the Home Affairs Department, the Agriculture and Fisheries Department, the Lands Department and the Housing Department. I believe that the resolution of disputes should move from the competitive style fostered by an adversarial system towards caring for others within a communal setting. I am also charged with the duty to conduct investigations into alleged breaches of the Code on Access to Information applied to all government policy bureaux and departments including the Police and the ICAC. So far my Office has dealt with five such complaints. Like the freedom of information legislations elsewhere, Hong Kong's Code on Access to Information is not simply to promote the individual's access to public information. It also promotes openness and accountability of the governmental system generally. I believe that any freedom of information act or code should attempt to balance the right to access and the right to privacy. Following the introduction of our Administrative Fairness Checklist and our Administrative Ethics Checklist, this Office will provide further guidance for public bodies by publishing The Ombudsman's Guide on Good Standards of Customer Service. The leaflet will provide a useful reference for the public service as to how they can best serve the community by delivering the services to customers in line with the objectives and missions of their organisations in a responsive, reasonable, fair, impartial and positive manner. In the past two years, we have organized three successful Complaint Management Workshops. The next one will be held on 1st April this year. We will soon publish a Handbook on Internal Complaint Handling for reference of the public sector organisations. To educate newly recruited public officers on the work, functions and complaint handling procedures of my Office, we intend to give talks and presentations in their induction training programmes in a structured manner. The Ombudsman Awards introduced last July are to be presented annually, in recognition of public sector organisations' positive and supportive stance towards the Ombudsman's investigation of complaints to bring about improvement in the quality of service and promote fairness in public administration. One of the important features of the Ombudsman institution is the power of an Ombudsman to make recommendations following his investigation into an alleged act of maladministration. In my case, I am empowered under Section 16 of The Ombudsman Ordinance to report my opinion and reasons together with the statement of any remedy that I consider should be provided and a statement of any recommendation that I think fit to make. At present, such recommendations are made to redress the grievances and propose administrative, procedural, policy or even legal changes with a view to preventing recurrence of similar mistakes and eventually to bringing about improvement in the quality and standard of the public administration. We are now devising guidelines on recommending appropriate and reasonable remedies to justified complaints based on the principle of "putting the complainant in the position he or she would have been in had the maladministration not occurred". I hope to announce such guidelines after consultations with the Administration. If an Ombudsman is to be of good service to the public, he must be clearly visible and easily accessible. In making the Ombudsman's services better understood and utilized, my Office continues with our public education and awareness initiatives including regular programmes of meeting Councils, Boards and public sector organisations. We intend to visit more organisations in the community. While schools and youth groups remain our key targets for outreaching, my Office is developing a teaching kit to educate the young about the Ombudsman system. Our Non-official Justices of the Peace (JPs) Assistance Scheme introduced in 1996 is bearing fruits. Almost half of all the JPs have joined the Scheme to promote the Ombudsman system and bring our attention to areas of concern or deficiencies in public administration. To further enhance the Scheme, we are exploring the possibility of arranging visits to Councils, departments and statutory bodies for our JPs in relation to the work of my Office. No culture, be it eastern or western, has a monopoly on concepts associated with fairness, justice, democracy and human rights. Human rights express universal requirements of social justice. The international practice today is that of encouraging the development of justice institutions to ensure good governance in every society. In many countries in which Ombudsman offices exist, the institution acts primarily as monitor of administrative unfairness. However, in a number of countries, the Ombudsman office plays a much more important and central role in the protection of human rights. Here in Hong Kong, my office acts as a deterrent against the misuse and abuse of public power to deny basic human rights by upholding the dignity of the individual and giving people the opportunity to question irregularity and unfairness in public administration and to challenge the appropriateness of official behaviour and actions. 1998 marks the 50th Anniversary of the United Nations' Universal Declaration of Human Rights. I intend to foster a proper understanding required in the right perspective of the work of my Office in the sphere of human rights. Hong Kong is now a Special Administrative Region of China. This has presented exciting challenges and also opportunities for my Office in improving the quality of public administration by promoting fair and ethical practices and by ensuring that public service providers are accountable for the quality of their performance. I will be proactive in performing my duties and I will use with dignity, my credibility to bring about change. I will continue to be a willing listener, a vigorous investigator, a sincere persuader and a neutral mediator seeking redress of grievances and resolution to disputes culturally appropriate to Hong Kong. (January 1998)
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