The Office of The Ombudsman is an independent statutory authority established in 1989 under the Ombudsman Ordinance. It redresses grievances arising from maladministration in the public sector and improves the standard of public administration through independent and impartial investigations.

In December 2001, the Office severed its link with the Administration and became a corporation sole. It has set up its own administrative system and recruits contract staff on its own remuneration packages.

Directly responsible to the Chief Executive, The Ombudsman serves as the community's monitor on government departments and public bodies specified in the schedule to the ordinance to ensure that:

Two exceptions to the monitoring system are the Hong Kong Police Force and the Independent Commission Against Corruption, both of which have their own separate bodies for dealing with public complaints.

The 17 major public organisations in the schedule are: the Airport Authority, the Employees Retraining Board, the Equal Opportunities Commission, Hong Kong Arts Development Council, Hong Kong Examinations and Assessment Authority, Hong Kong Housing Authority, Hong Kong Housing Society, Hong Kong Monetary Authority, Hong Kong Sports Institute Limited, the Hospital Authority, Kowloon-Canton Railway Corporation, the Legislative Council Secretariat, the Mandatory Provident Fund Schemes Authority, the Office of the Privacy Commissioner for Personal Data, the Securities and Futures Commission, the Urban Renewal Authority and the Vocational Training Council.

Apart from investigating complaints, The Ombudsman may initiate direct investigations of her own volition into matters of public interest and widespread concern, and publish the reports. This proactive and preventive approach aims to address problems affecting a broad spectrum of the community. The direct investigations are particularly useful in redressing administrative flaws of a systemic nature and addressing fundamental problems or underlying causes for complaint.

Since 1994, when The Ombudsman was empowered to undertake direct investigations, 53 such investigations have been completed — two of them in 2005. These two concerned:

	•	the letting of market stalls by auction by the Food and Environmental Hygiene Department; and
	•	the monitoring of property services agents by the Housing Department.

The reports of all direct investigations have been published and are available for public scrutiny at the Office's Resource Centre.

The Ombudsman Ordinance also empowers The Ombudsman to investigate complaints of non-compliance with the Code on Access to Information against government departments, including the Hong Kong Police Force and the Independent Commission Against Corruption. The Ombudsman is also empowered to act as an independent review body in respect of an alleged breach of the code.

The Office received 14 400 enquiries and 4 389 complaints in 2005, compared with 12 115 enquiries and 4 822 complaints in 2004. The areas attracting substantial numbers of complaints were related to error, wrong advice or decision, failure to follow procedures or delay, negligence or omission, disparity in treatment, lack of response to complaints, staff attitude and ineffective control. Some departments or organisations have more complaints than others as, by nature of their services, they have more direct, frequent and extensive contact with members of the public.

Although The Ombudsman has no authority to enforce her recommendations, over 99 per cent of the recommendations made were accepted by the organisations concerned in 2005.