Good morning. Welcome to this meeting of the Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee. Today, the Committee is holding a pre-appointment hearing for the post of Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman. The Chair of the Committee, Simon Hoare, has recused himself from this hearing and consideration of the report that will follow, as he played a role earlier in the process as a member of the interview panel. We are joined by the preferred candidate for the post, Paula Sussex CBE. Good morning, and thank you for coming along. Will you please introduce yourself for the record?

Good morning. I am Paula Sussex, preferred candidate for the role of Parliamentary Ombudsman.

Thank you. I will kick off with the first set of questions. What made you apply for the role of Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman?

Good morning to all. This is an important time for public service, but in particular for citizens in respect of their trust and confidence in public service. The role of the PHSO is to make it transparently obvious that there is a place for redress. That is tremendously important. The PHSO also plays an active role in identifying how public service can be systemically improved. So it is a compelling opportunity.

Absolutely. Did anyone in Government suggest that you should apply?

No.

Okay. Fantastic. Will you talk a little about your main personal qualities, and the professional skills and experience that you think equip you to take on the role?

My professional experience gives me a good background for this role, from running service organisations in the public and private sectors with the Student Loans Company, and my work in technology and service businesses. That gives me an understanding and an empathy for transaction processing, and much of Government is about transaction processing. Importantly, my role as chief exec at the Charity Commission has given me understanding of a law-based role, but with the discretion and the judgment that you need to put in as a regulator. Finally, at a time when technology and operations are so important, having a strong background in that is, I think, helpful to any part of the public service at the moment.

How do you think those previous roles prepared you for the pressures of the individual responsibility and the high-profile decision making that come with the role of ombudsman?

In 2014, the Charity Commission was not—perhaps it can be phrased like this—in good odour with Parliament or indeed the charity sector. I, the team and of course the board had to pick our way carefully through that while charting the strategy for the business, for the organisation, to move more towards compliance and a sort of watchfulness, while also building the confidence of the third sector and of Parliament. I am therefore quite used to a tricky and high-profile period when an organisation was deemed to be not performing. I think that that is particularly helpful. With Student Loans, I was keenly aware that we were accountable for financial accounts, financial statements, for 6 million repaying customers, but also that we were financially enabling the future, through education, of about 1.5 million applicants for student finance every year. That is quite an accountability.

Do you see any gaps in your CV and past experience when it comes to preparing yourself for the role of an ombudsman?

There is always room for careful listening and learning, without a doubt. I would not call it a gap, but given how important the health service is to the business of the PHSO, that is certainly an area where I would want to invest more time in understanding what the issues are and understanding the implications of the current machinery of government reforms.

One of my colleagues will ask some further questions about that a little later on. If you are appointed, what professional or voluntary work commitments will you continue to undertake alongside your new role?

None that would conflict with the role.

Can you detail what those might be?

I currently sit on the board of the Infected Blood Compensation Authority, and that is a role that I would have to give up, sadly.

Are there any others that the Committee should be aware of?

No.

Thank you very much. I will hand over to my colleague Sam Carling, who will talk a little bit more about the background for the role.

Thank you very much for coming in. It is very good of you. The role has a seven-year term in the first instance. Would you serve the full term if appointed?

If I perform in the role, yes.

Very much a fair answer, I guess. What would you set out to achieve in your first year in the role?

It is quite hard to know at the moment because obviously I have not had exposure to the organisation, but I think the first thing is to look at the organisation itself and to understand what its current strengths are and build on those. I can imagine, although I am not giving this as a forecast, that more can be done to improve the efficiency with which we do the casework. There is likely to be a technology answer in there, and possibly a process answer. Also, what I would like to do is to understand how the insights from the data that the PHSO pretty much alone receives—the data in those 30-odd thousand complaints—could be used constructively and effectively to identify and support the improvement of public service, working with other parts of central Government, perhaps. I would say, in summary, it would be to increase the value and the impact of the PHSO.

That is really useful to hear. How should we measure success in that?

In the traditional metrics, you can measure in case-handling, of course. If I take it back to the private sector, you can measure in net promoter score or customer effort score and so on. Those are the basics, but wider than that—this is very hard to put a quantitative measure on—there is the support that the organisation can give to improving public service. That will be in part in its voice and in part potentially through a stronger highlight on systemic issues, which then potentially other parts of Government take on to address.

We mentioned governance, and I was really interested to hear the discussion around data use. I appreciate that this might be quite a detailed question, so do not worry if you are unable to answer it, but do you think the current governance arrangements at the PHSO are appropriate? If not, do you have in mind any particular changes to them?

It is a unique organisation in a number of respects, and I am sure governance will be something that we will want to have another look at.

You talked a little bit about your fintech experience. Do you have any idea of the kind of digital changes that need to happen at the PHSO?

I do not for the PHSO, and it would be inappropriate for me to surmise. As a general proposition and across government, however, yes, there is a role that artificial intelligence can play, but first off you need to have the data in good order—don’t imagine that you can wave a magic wand. There are also regulatory and ethical issues, and sometimes legislative issues, about handing over any form of decision making to artificial intelligence; none the less, there will be a role there. Certainly, in many parts of government now, productivity is increased by simple things—for example, the first draft of a submission can often be done much faster. You always need human oversight, though. That is certainly one area. While I do not know what the casework systems are, in both the Charity Commission and with Student Loans, simply putting in effective customer relationship management systems—PHSO may have done so—enabled them to flag, for example, where cases were getting stuck and needed to be pulled out of the queue to have separate scrutiny. Over and above all of that—and again, not knowing the approach that the PHSO takes—triaging out the more systemic, the more strategic, or the trickier cases for more policy-based review is quite possibly something that the organisation, if it is not doing at the moment, would benefit from.

I certainly think it needs to focus on the impact that it has in the primary job, for the citizens it serves, and improving the value there. As I said before, there should be more of a focus on—although I cannot define it at the moment—playing a more active role in the improvement of public service. That could also be a more proactive role in the improvement of public service.

I am sure there will always be a case that indicates, because it is such a broad spread, but it would be important for me to explore the potential for picking up leading indicators to things that might be going wrong in the public service. Of course, serving as I do on the tremendous organisation, the Infected Blood Compensation Authority, I have seen what can go wrong if those leading indicators are not picked up on and dealt with. That is something that I would go to the organisation with, as a thesis at least.

Between Manchester and London.

Don’t know yet. I was one of many accounting officers during covid who brought hybrid working in, in effect, and studied it. It absolutely has its benefits. It very much depends on the culture of the organisation, sometimes the demographic of the organisation and the nature of the work. Much of PHSO’s work is considerative, but if you have a strong programme of bringing in trainee claims managers, for example, they need to sit with someone, because much of the experience and learning is informal—some of it is codified, I am sure. The short answer is: don’t know yet.

Most of the staff and the larger premises are in Manchester. Have you had any discussions at all around the proportion of time that you might need to spend up there to ensure that you are on top of things?

No. I have had one preliminary conversation with the chief executive officer, Rebecca.

The 2023 PHSO staff survey demonstrated that 35% of staff do not think that change is managed very well at the organisation. It has been quite an uncertain time at the top of the PHSO, as we know. Do you have any thoughts on how you could work to increase stability at the PHSO if you are appointed as the ombudsman?

It is very, very understandable that you get that sort of response when an organisation has uncertainty. Post covid, public service across the piece is perhaps in a more uncertain frame of mind, full stop. What is important to me is that, as with any organisation, if you lead a strategy, the extent to which it has had clear input from the full team is really important, but then it is a matter of quite intensive communications, accessibility, visibility. To me, one of the most important things is that you do what you say you are going to do, when you say you are going to do it. That builds trust and confidence in the team.

Following on from that, the same survey suggested that there is some dissatisfaction with pay and career development opportunities. In February this year, over 200 employees held a one-day strike, so there has been industrial action recently as well. How would you work to prevent further industrial action from happening, and how would you seek to deal with some of the issues around staff confidence and satisfaction?

Pay has been quite a concern for many public servants over the last few years, and, to a very large extent, pay is outside our direct control. Again, in so far as any industrial action is not based on the simple matter of pay, it is about how to instil the confidence and engagement of staff through, as I said, communications and engagement. Career development is often about the structure of the organisation, but also about its relationship with other Government bodies and the ability to develop your career, perhaps on rotation in similar public agencies.

We have some questions now on ombudsman performance and service quality.

I do not need to tell you this, but obviously the PHSO has a vital role, particularly with regard to health, and the vast majority of the complaints received are health related. As far as I am aware, you do not have any experience of working in the health sector. I wonder how you intend to develop more knowledge in this area.

Carefully, is the first answer. When I was running a body called Atos Consulting, I had a very good team of health consultants who did a lot of work in the trusts, so I was quite engaged with that. There was a lot of business process re-engineering in acute services and whole-system analysis, which looked at the whole trust environment, so I did have some understanding of it there. I also have close friends and family who work in health regulation, so I am familiar with some of the issues. Exactly as you said, because it is such a significant part of the work, it is an area in which I would look to spend quite some time understanding what the issues are. I would certainly visit primary and secondary healthcare at both levels. With the quite rapid news of the merger of DHSC and NHSE, there will potentially be a period where the health service itself is trying to figure out which way is up, so in some respects we will be in the same boat. For anybody who has been through the health service recently, what can be done with the funds available and what can be done with rising demand is absolutely critical. It is the area where I would devote quite significant amounts of time to understand what the issues are.

Since the covid-19 pandemic, the PHSO has been experiencing high levels of demand on its service, and this increasingly looks like the organisation’s new normal. How do you intend to go about leading a large organisation with such significant demands on its services while operating in a difficult economic climate? You have already answered some of this, but I am conscious that health services are shifting significantly, and the structures are changing. How do you get that balance right and make sure it copes with this increasing demand?

It is a really difficult issue. Of course, some of it is about the sheer productivity—the ability to process cases accurately, but more effectively and faster. There is almost always some productivity element. I know that the organisation has been looking at how it triages cases to some degree—whether there is a fast track and what it takes in to consider—so there may be further work that can be done there. There is a communications effort that can help here as well, about where a citizen can go in the first instance for redress, potentially, but there is also a subtler, more difficult point, which is about the relationship between the state and the citizen—what the state can and cannot do. Indeed, the PHSO has already taken this approach on its website by saying, “What we can do, and what we can’t do,” so it is meeting the right expectations and addressing those.

You will be aware of the various interactions between the PHSO and the Government over the last couple of years relating to WASPI. I believe there was a general problem with trying to get the DWP to engage with the ombudsman to start with. The final report was put down before Parliament. I am not aware of any other occasion when a report has been submitted directly to Parliament rather than to the Department. The report recommended that the Government make compensation payments to those affected by the changes. The Government rejected that and made a number of criticisms of the report. Could you give us your take on that interaction?

Once again, I have not seen the non-public detail about WASPI, but it is entirely right for the PHSO to have come to the conclusion if it did that based on the facts and on its enabling legislation. From time to time, it will happen that Government says, “No, we don’t accept that.” Indeed, at the Charity Commission, there were instances where I and other bodies, or I and the courts, or I and Parliament disagreed on a particular point. The key thing, however—it was a very high-profile case—is for it not to become a trend.

Clearly, the PHSO relies upon organisations choosing to accept its findings. Government is highly visible, and this is a highly visible case. Do you have any concerns about the potential wider impacts of non-compliance in this case upon PHSO recommendations?

As I say, I do not think it has had any impact now, but if this were the thin end of any sized wedge, that would be a concern.

What could be done to maximise the PHSO’s impact across the organisations being investigated, particularly in areas like spreading best practice and compliance?

Probably quite a lot. Some 30,000 complaints are a gift—they are a window on the world, and a number of those will have insights that will resonate with accounting officers. Good accounting officers will usually know where their organisation is delivering and where it is not delivering. Being able to use that while maintaining independence in a more constructive way, and possibly in a way that the National Audit Office is able to do with some impact, would be really helpful and a good use of the taxpayer money that goes into the PHSO. As I said, how the PHSO could play that more active role in improving public service is something that I would seek to understand in the first year.

Do you have any concerns about resourcing any of the initial tasks?

I am sure that every public servant would say that they do not have enough resources. But sometimes, it is a question of prioritising and allocating resources to the right objectives.

Sticking with resourcing, have you had any assurances in relation to the PHSO’s future budget?

No.

Thank you. I will hand over to Charlotte Cane to kick off with some questions around relationships with stakeholders.

First and foremost, the citizens who come to it for redress. It is always very difficult to collectively identify them as a body, but they are the primary stakeholders for the PHSO. Parliament, of course, is enormously important in respect of reporting performance, and reporting insights as well. In my previous experience I have tended to find that advocacy bodies that happen to be registered charities are also hugely important in understanding the issues and being a place in civil society where citizens want to express their desire for change and improvement. The PHSO should—I am sure it does—see itself as being somewhat in a glass bowl, having a number of points of accountability and responsibility.

In the first few months, it is about learning the perspective—individually, collectively and in formal and informal meetings. It is vital always to preserve the independence, but listening to perspective is incredibly important. As for the governance of the organisation, there might be potential, if it is constitutionally or legally appropriate—for example, on the infected blood board we have user consultants, who are members of the infected and affected community sitting very close to the board. That may be a more systematic and structured way of getting that insight. But in the first few months, I would seek to see what is in place and where I think I can make any improvements, if required, on that.

At the Charity Commission we had many stakeholdings, to put it mildly—certainly with the charity umbrella bodies such as ACEVO and NCVO, but also with Parliament and the sponsorship body and with the charities themselves. Some of the larger charities would often come on a particular issue, such as safeguarding. Then, although not stakeholders, our relationship with the other regulators was really important.

Let me bring in Markus before we move on to the next set of questions.

Do you think that the public profile of the PHSO is sufficient? Do the public know what it is, what it does and how it can help them?

Probably not.

Is there anything that you may wish to do about that?

Probably not, and apologies for saying, “Don’t know yet”, but on what the PHSO is trying to do, it has quite a low profile. Given that Parliament has given it this responsibility and accountability—it is tremendous that our primary job is to stand there for citizens, as the last port of redress, and that this is what we aim to do—that is an important message that possibly needs to be better understood and better heard.

Can anything from your previous experience in quite senior roles be replicated at the PHSO to improve its profile?

Possibly, yes. At the Charity Commission, an excellent communications team took its reputation and gave it more of a voice, and it has gone from strength to strength. That was particularly important as we had a very large number of regulated entities—180,000-odd. In a small organisation, we needed to use the power of broadcast communications and social media to reach more with our message. Student Loans is a transaction processing organisation that needs to get the job done, and quite simply, clinically, effectively and cost-effectively, which it does. It depends on the purpose of raising the profile—to what end are you raising the profile?

The first thing goes back to what I said before—the expectations. I am going to assume that that 48% was where the case was upheld. There is always a skewing difference if the case is not taken up and no redress or compensation is offered. First of all, it is the expectation of what the PHSO can do. Digging into that statistic would be really important. Is it the time it took? Is it the way it was handled? As I said, is it the result? We have to understand that. Before we have done that analysis, we cannot really get to the root causes. I am sure that the PHSO is in exactly the same position today—we would want to see that higher.

It could be. I am sure that that is a possibility. Again, without having seen it in the round and taken the perspective of the caseworkers as well as reading the data and the surveys, I would not like to judge at the moment.

At Student Loans, we had quite a strong constituent of vulnerable students, so I have some familiarity of dealing with customers who have physical or mental impairments. What is hugely important is something that many parts of the public sector do: there is some excellent training for vulnerability, which I am sure that PHSO has been doing, about how to engage with vulnerable customers and those at risk. If they have not done that training, there are a number of organisations that are very well versed. It is very different dealing with a distressed, vulnerable citizen customer, possibly at the end of their tether, which is quite often where they will be by the time they get to PHSO, from how it is for us in this engagement now.

I would hope and imagine that the organisation has a culture of empathy and can stand in the shoes of customers, understanding what it is like to have lost a dear one or the right to a benefit, to be down on your luck and going from one part of the state to the next over time. That empathy is really important. Monitoring it will be in terms of what the hard statistics say on the satisfaction rate. One thing I did at Student Loans was to talk to complainants themselves. Every week we would sit down and go through CEO or MP complaints. On occasion, we would speak to or meet the complainant to listen. Not much replaces the primary experience of listening to an aggrieved customer. That has been the same in my private sector work.

Thank you. Before I move on to a few questions about ombudsman reform, I am interested to know, as you come into the role, what kind of culture you want to establish. You have talked about empathy, which is very important. Is there anything else you are keen to instil in the organisation?

Empathy and efficiency are critical when spending taxpayers’ money. We all need to ask whether we are spending it in the wisest possible way. Effectiveness is a bigger question. We need to reflect on what we are here to do and the difference we are making—perhaps not on a daily basis, because that could drive you mad, but to reflect seriously on the impact we are making. That is the desire for productivity and effectiveness. Going back to what I said about identifying systemic root causes of where the public and health service can be improved, we have powers of analysis. What is the trend here? What are we seeing? It is about asking whether it is a leading indicator of something. In terms of skills and perspectives, I would be looking for all of those.

That is a perfect segue into our final set of questions from Markus Campbell-Savours.

Over a number of years there have been conversations about how the PHSO could be reformed. Would you tell us your views on that, and where you think those reforms may be necessary?

I am sorry to say again that I will come back with a more considered view. At the moment, as you have raised, looking at its reputation and the respect with which it is known, it is about what we can do about the raw delivery statistics and satisfaction rates. In terms of its role and purpose, I know that in Rob Behrens’ tenure he was looking at a more proactive role for the ombudsman, which I might like to consider. That might be reform or simply extracting more value from the insight that can be taken from all those complaints of citizens, and then taking that into wider Government to say that these are some of the root cause trends, but also this is where we can see public service doing well. That is something that I would very much like to lean into. How that is done, as of yet, I do not know.

One of the issues that has come up when the Committee has previously engaged with the PHSO is the MP filter. It was originally put in place because of concerns from Members of Parliament that having an ombudsman may in some way direct people away from their MPs and to the ombudsman instead, removing MPs’ influence in these matters. Do you have any views on that particular reform, or on any alternatives?

I know this is quite a live and important issue. It is incredibly important not to separate the citizen from their democratic representative. I do not know whether removing the MP filter would do that at this point, but it would need to be very carefully considered. The operational impact would need to be considered as well—the extent to which that might radically increase casework and whether that is the right thing. I would certainly look at that, because I know it is a live issue and an important one for parliamentarians, as they have a direct interest in it.

If there are no more questions from Committee members, is there anything else that you would like to let us know, Paula? Paula Sussex indicated dissent.

Thank you very much for your time and your clear and concise responses to our questions. The Clerks will be in touch with you about next steps. That concludes today’s evidence session.