During the Extraordinary General Meeting of the Association of Mediterranean Ombudsman (AOM), the Commissioner for Administration and the Protection of Human Rights of Cyprus, Maria Stylianou-Lottides, was elected Vice President of the AOM. She succeeds the Ombudsman of Slovenia, Mr. Peter Svetina, who has now been elected as President of the AOM.

The Extraordinary General Meeting also voted on the expulsion of Russia from the AOM. The decision to expel Russia was primarily based on concerns that the High Commissioner for Human Rights in the Russian Federation had not acted independently from the Russian administration. The AOM Governing Board found that the Russian Commissioner’s public statements and actions were aligned with the Russian government’s narrative, particularly in relation to the war in Ukraine. This raised doubts about the Commissioner’s ability to impartially safeguard human rights, a fundamental principle of the AOM. The Governing Board concluded that the Russian Commissioner’s actions breached the association’s statutes, leading to her expulsion.

Following the meeting, the Ombudsman of Malta, Judge Emeritus Joseph Zammit McKeon, congratulated Ms. Stylianou-Lottides on her election and expressed his anticipation for further collaboration within the AOM.

The programme of events in Cyprus will continue on Thursday, 26th September, with a conference on Protecting Human Rights in the Digital Age and on Social Media.

Primer encuentro entre la síndica y el presidente Illa

El objetivo es fijar un marco de máxima colaboración y unos canales de comunicación rápidos y eficaces

El presidente de la Generalitat, Salvador Illa, se ha reunido esta tarde con la síndica de greuges de Cataluña, Esther Giménez-Salinas, en el marco de la ronda de contactos que está manteniendo con las principales instituciones del país.

La síndica ha ofrecido la colaboración de la institución para mejorar y transformar la Administración: “El conocimiento de la realidad social que tenemos gracias a las quejas de los ciudadanos nos coloca en una posición singular para impulsar un cambio profundo de la Administración, para que sea más valiente y más eficaz en la defensa de los derechos de las personas.”

La síndica ha manifestado la necesidad de establecer unos canales de comunicación directos, fluidos y constantes entre la Generalitat y la institución que permitan actuar rápidamente cuando se detectan servicios o políticas que no funcionan. También ha pedido al Gobierno que reduzca urgentemente los plazos de respuesta.

Durante la reunión, la síndica ha trasladado al presidente los temas que preocupan a la institución. En esta línea, ha denunciado que la Administración no está suficientemente preparada para atender a la Cataluña actual de los ocho millones, y le ha entregado el Informe al Parlamento 2023, presentado el pasado mes de marzo, en el que se recogen los cinco principales déficits de la Administración para dar respuesta a esta nueva situación social.

El tema principal que se ha tratado en la reunión ha sido el ámbito de los derechos sociales, que supone el 50% de las quejas que llegan a la institución. La síndica ha insistido una vez más en la necesidad de que el sistema protector de la infancia sea más garantista, y ha defendido, en esta línea, que los servicios residenciales pasen a ser el último recurso.

En cuanto a la pobreza energética, ha remarcado la necesidad de regular de manera ágil los procedimientos para acogerse a las ayudas para hacer frente a los gastos de luz, agua y gas. Respecto a las prestaciones sociales, como la renta garantizada de ciudadanía y el ingreso mínimo vital, la síndica pide que se simplifiquen y se automaticen los procedimientos para solicitarlas.

También ha hablado de la necesidad de tener una Administración más ágil y más amable con las personas. Es necesario potenciar la vocación de servicio público del funcionariado y hay que abrirse a nuevas maneras de resolver los conflictos que incluyan la mirada restaurativa, poniendo el foco en la reparación del daño y no en la sanción. La síndica ha expresado también que hay que reformular el sistema de acceso a la función pública, de forma que sea menos memorístico y que haga hincapié en las competencias humanas y profesionales para resolver las necesidades actuales de la ciudadanía. Así mismo, ha manifestado la necesidad de garantizar siempre la formación continua dentro de la Administración pública.

En cuanto a la cita previa, ha insistido en que hace falta un marco normativo común en todas las administraciones.

En materia de medio ambiente, la síndica ha destacado la necesidad de impulsar las energías renovables de manera compatible con el respeto al territorio, por lo cual resulta imprescindible disponer de un mapa y un calendario del despliegue de fuentes de energía eólica y solar.

Dolores Fernández Galiño, Valedora do Pobo, y María Castro, responsable del área de igualdad, mantuvieron ayer en la institución una reunión con Verónica Marcos Arrojo, presidenta de FADEMUR Galicia.

En dicha reunión se trataron temas como la situación de la mujer en el rural, violencia de género, la participación activa o el rol de la mujer cuidadora.

The Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman is reiterating its call for care providers to be required to tell people about its service, after highlighting the relatively small number of cases it deals with about the independent sector.

In its Annual Review of Adult Social Care Complaints 2023-24, the number of complaints about privately funded and arranged care has dropped by 15%, following a continued trend over the past few years. This number, the Ombudsman says, is far lower than it would expect given the sector’s proportion of the care market. Over the past year, the Ombudsman received 2,982 complaints about adult care, with just 333 of those being from people who fund their own care.

In order to bridge the gap between the number of people in receipt of care in the independent sector, and the low volume of complaints, the Ombudsman is calling for signposting to its services to be made mandatory at the end of every provider’s complaint process.

Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman, Ms Amerdeep Somal said:

“People have a right to bring their complaint about adult social care to us, as the independent scrutineer. However, they don’t always know they can do so, and independent care providers should be signposting them to us, just as councils do. Independent care providers will often have both private and council-funded clients, and there should be the same route to redress however people’s care is funded.

“It is likely that low awareness of our role in privately funded and arranged care plays a part in creating this gap between the expectation and reality of the number of complaints we receive. Independent care providers are not required by law to signpost users to our service, and as it currently stands, we know it happens sporadically. 

“As a result, people are potentially missing out on their right to access our services, and providers are missing out on the opportunity to learn from mistakes and to improve their services. We want the services provided by the care sector to be excellent across the board: we carry out our work to not only give individual redress but to improve services for everyone.

“If all care providers were required by law to signpost to us it would give confidence that people know where to come with complaints and would support any suggestion that the drop in complaint numbers is caused by something other than a lack of awareness.”

In 2023-24 the Ombudsman upheld 80% of all adult social care (including council delivered care) cases it investigated in detail, with 99% of organisations complying with the remedies the Ombudsman recommended to put things right.

Key areas of concern over the past year have been delays in the assessment of people’s needs, and a failure to put people at the centre of the care they receive, instead fitting that care in with council and providers’ systems.

Poor communication with both clients and their families has also been an area of concern throughout the process, with particular issues around the information provided to service-users, and their families, being unclear or overly complex.

Alongside the annual review, the Ombudsman has also released data for all the organisations, both councils and independent, about whom it has received complaints in the past year, including information about uphold and compliance rates.

Article date: 26 September 2024

Link: https://curia.europa.eu/jcms/upload/docs/application/pdf/2024-09/cp240151en.pdf

Languages available: es de en fr it pl pt

PRESS RELEASE No 151/24

Luxembourg, 26 September 2024

Judgment of the Court in Case C-600/22 P | Puigdemont i Casamajó and Comín i Oliveres v Parliament

The Court of Justice definitively dismisses the action brought by Mr Puigdemont and Mr Comín against the refusal of the President of the European Parliament to recognise their status as Members of the European Parliament in June 2019

Following the holding, on 1st October 2017, of the referendum on the self-determination of Catalonia (Spain), criminal proceedings were brought against Carles Puigdemont i Casamajó and Antoni Comín i Oliveres (who, at the time, were President and Member of the Autonomous Government of Catalonia, respectively). Since Mr Puigdemont and Mr Comín had left Spain, those proceedings were suspended until they were found. National arrest warrants were issued against them. Mr Puigdemont and Mr Comín subsequently stood as candidates and were elected in the elections to the European Parliament which were held in Spain on 26 May 2019.

On 29 May 2019, the President of the European Parliament issued an instruction stating, first, that all the candidates elected in Spain should be refused access to the ‘special welcome service’ provided to persons newly elected to the European Parliament and, second, that those candidates’ accreditation should be suspended until official confirmation of their election.  (...)