Gwasanaethau Ombwdsmon Cymru

Members will recall that the Assembly Government’s long term objective is to bring together the three existing Ombudsman jurisdictions in Wales into a single office. As an interim step, we took advantage of the vacancies that would occur this year in all three offices to hold an open appointments exercise to identify one person simultaneously to hold the three existing offices. Following completion of that process, it was announced on 10 September  that Adam Peat, then  Director of the Local Government and Culture Group within the Welsh Assembly Government, would become Commissioner for Local Administration in Wales (ie Local Government Ombudsman) from 1 October 2003, and Health Service Commissioner for Wales from 4 November 2003. Adam has already taken up the first of these posts.

As the law presently stands, it is not possible for the offices of Welsh Administration Ombudsman and Commissioner for Local Administration in Wales to be held simultaneously by the same person. The Secretary of State is therefore promoting a Regulatory Reform Order in Parliament to remove this restriction; a consultation exercise on the draft Order revealed strong support for the proposal, and it is hoped that the Order will be obtained in the first quarter of 2004. In the meantime, Ann Abraham has agreed to continue to serve as Welsh Administration Ombudsman until a date to be agreed in the autumn of 2004, at which point Adam Peat will assume that office also.

Our longer term objective for a single Ombudsman office for Wales cannot however be achieved without primary legislation. Last March the Assembly endorsed the Cabinet’s proposal for a Bill to achieve this, and we now need to work up the proposal in greater detail. Earlier this year the Wales Office and the Welsh Assembly Government consulted on some implications of a unified office, but we also undertook, if there was support for the idea of a single Ombudsman for Wales, to consult again on the exact scope of the office’s powers and jurisdiction. A further consultation paper, “A Public Services Ombudsman for Wales: Powers and Jurisdiction” is therefore being published today, inviting views on those issues. Responses are invited by 19 December 2003, and I hope Assembly Members, as well as wide range of individuals and organisations, will let us have their comments on the issues raised.