Source · Select Committees · Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee
Recommendation 5
5
Accepted in Part
Paragraph: 27
The PHSO should set out how it plans to take to address the three-long term,...
Recommendation
The PHSO should set out how it plans to take to address the three-long term, low performing scores relating to how evidence is gathered, how decisions are reached and how decisions are made in a timely final decision.
Government response summary AI-generated
The PHSO has delivered and fulfilled 22 of the 25 recommendations of the Clinical Advice Review and are progressing the remaining three recommendations. They are carrying out a phased roll-out of the sharing of provisional view reports with clinical advisers and applying lessons learnt to future phases.
Summary of the government's response below — read the verbatim text to verify.
Paragraph Reference:
27
Government Response
Accepted in Part
HM Government · verbatim extract
Accepted in Part
The Service Charter provides a valuable source of feedback about people’s experiences of PHSO’s service. We are committed to improving people’s experience of PHSO’s service and, in turn, improving these three low-performing scores. However, as we advised the Committee at the oral evidence hearing on 14 December 2021, there are a number of different factors that influence complainants’ feedback, including whether PHSO reached the decision they were hoping for. As part of PHSO’s quality assurance of complaint handling, we look at how effectively we have evaluated all available evidence to make an impartial decision. This takes account Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman Scrutiny 2020–21: PHSO and Government responses 3 of whether we have gathered all the relevant evidence. It also considers whether we have carried out a sufficiently impartial, detailed, and critical analysis to reach a robust decision. We continue to train and develop new staff in order to maintain this consistently high level of impartiality and effective evaluation of evidence. We expect Service Charter scores in relation to timely decisions to improve as we reduce waiting times for cases to be allocated and also the time it takes to close cases. We have plans in place to continue reducing the current queue of cases in the coming year by recruiting and training new caseworkers, and by focusing resources on completing oldest cases first. We are also in the early stages of developing a significant new programme of casework improvements, including a new digital casework service that is automated, where possible, to improve efficiency while ensuring our service remains accessible and easy to use for all. Please also see our response to recommendations four and five, below.
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