Statistics published today by the Scottish Public Services Ombudsman (SPSO) reveal the extent of complaints she received from the people of Scotland. SPSO received 3,527 complaints from April 2022 to the end of March 2023. Nearly two-thirds were about the Health sector (34%) and Local Authorities (30%).
Other sectors complained about included Housing Associations (10%), Prisons (7%), Universities (6%), Scottish Government and devolved organisations (5%), Joint Health and Social Care (4%), Water (2%) and Further Education Colleges (1%).
In the same period, the SPSO closed 3,829 cases. This is a 10% increase on last year, the result of strenuous efforts to reduce unallocated and older complaints as the SPSO emerged from the impact of COVID.
In 2022-23, the SPSO closed 192 complaints at the investigation stage (5% of total cases closed). Not all complaints received by the SPSO can be investigated, and some are not considered beyond initial enquiries for a variety of reasons. Around 13% of cases were closed because the SPSO didn’t have the powers to investigate, or the complaint was brought to the SPSO before it had been looked into appropriately by the organisation being complained about. A further 1,288 cases (34% of total cases closed) were closed after initial enquiries because it was determined that the organisation had already investigated and responded reasonably to the complaint.
Rosemary Agnew, the Scottish Public Services Ombudsman, said:
“The year 2022—23 focused on recovery from the impact of COVID on us and public services. I am proud of the progress we made compared to the year before, but recognise we need to keep a focus on continued improvement and having positive impact.
Not all complaints need the same level of investigation and we increasingly see the positive impact of our work on good complaints handling across the Scottish public sector in the quality of local complaint handling. This means that often we don’t have to investigate beyond our initial enquiries because a good local investigation has identified learning and resulted in the action that we would have asked for in those circumstances.”
Following investigation, the SPSO made 350 recommendations to public sector bodies. Over half of these (183) were for learning and improvement to ensure the issue complained about doesn’t happen again. A further 32 (9%) of recommendations made were for complaints handling improvements.
Rosemary Agnew, the Scottish Public Services Ombudsman, explained:
“We are driven by our values, and learning and improvement are integral to our approach. Our recommendations reflect this drive and our commitment to public service improvement. So many of the people who come to us don’t want others to experience what they did, and our aim is to share the learning we identify as widely as we can.”
Full data tables for the 2022-23 annual statistics are available on our statistics page. These will be explored in detail in the 2022—23 SPSO Annual Report, which will be laid before Parliament in October.
Note: At the time of publication we reported that SPSO made 348 recommendations (182 for learning and improvement). This has since been amended to 350 and 183 respectively.