Welcome to the third issue of our electronic newsletter. As always, our goal is to inform you about the work our office does as we investigate complaints of unfair treatment – and how it may impact you as a front line worker or decision-maker in government.
In this issue, you’ll find a preview of our annual statistics for 2013-14 (additional facts and figures will appear in our annual report, out later this summer). For now, this provides a snapshot of which departments and authorities received the highest number of complaints, and the number of investigations we’ve launched and closed.
This issue also contains an update to three own motion investigations our office launched this past year. Own motion investigations are an important tool that allows us to investigate systemic issues that may be at play in various ministries, government programs, or other entities – and work with government to help settle these problems.
Finally, our investigators have been visiting Alberta government employees and residents across the province. We offer some insight from those trips.
Our hope is this information is useful to you as government employees and decision-makers. By improving our communication with those in government, our hope is we continue to build on our success in educating and helping employees deliver better, and more fair, services for Albertans.
Peter Hourihan
Alberta Ombudsman
