Source · Select Committees · Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee
Recommendation 5
5
Deferred
Paragraph: 24
Outline government collaboration with NHS England to promote mediation culture and training for staff.
Recommendation
The potential barriers presented by training and culture among NHS staff to increasing mediation cannot be overcome solely by the PHSO. Other stakeholders, including the Government, have a role to play in promoting mediation. The Government should outline how it is working with NHS England and other relevant stakeholders to promote a culture and training that is supportive of mediation among NHS staff and those working in government departments.
Government Response Summary
The government's response did not address the recommendation about promoting a culture and training supportive of mediation. Instead, it discussed the PHSO's 'severity of injustice' approach to case management and its ongoing testing of a new 'public value model' for triage.
Paragraph Reference:
24
Government Response
Deferred
HM Government
Deferred
PHSO, like all other ombudsman services, receives a number of complaints that relate to very minor issues (e.g. a rude receptionist or a one-off complaint due to annoyance, frustration or inconvenience as opposed to prolonged distress, pain or devastation). It is important that cases of serious avoidable harm, death and serious financial distress are prioritised ahead of cases of minor grievances, annoyance and inconvenience. This is common practice in the ombudsman sector to ensure fair and effective use of public funds. complaints. Although this was put in place initially temporarily due to the pandemic and the subsequent backlog, the continued escalation in demand for our service means that this approach may have to be sustained for the near future. To enable us to operate as effectively as possible and deliver the greatest value for money, we are exploring a new ‘public value model’ which is being tested internally as part of our triage process. The model we are testing is broader than the current approach and considers additional factors alongside severity. Our objectives are to ensure that our resources are used to deliver greatest possible impact and to improve our abilities to predict and respond to demand for our service. The criteria we are currently testing are: • severity of injustice level of the case; • complainant’s individual needs and additional support requirements; • whether the complainant is from a group who don’t usually access our service, or are otherwise disadvantaged; • whether the wider public have shown an interest in this topic; and • whether the case is potentially systemic. Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman Scrutiny 2022–23: Government and PHSO response 7 of the public, former complainants, advocacy groups, and organisations we investigate. We will be reviewing the feedback from users, alongside the results from internal testing to reach a recommendation for a future model. We plan to report back to the Committee on these findings after the launch of the public value model and we would be happy to provide further information as required, given the importance of this approach to our work and the interest of the Committee.