The European Ombudsman
--> [ Letter Draft 2004-05 | Legal Remedies | Nikiforos Diamandouros ]
Overview
The European Ombudsman is a contact person for European citizens which complain about malpractise of the EU institutions. Currently P. Nikiforos Diamandouros is EU-Ombudsman. The EOM is appointed by Europarl after each election for the duration of its mandate. He works independently in same building. For personal complainst and cases related to misapplication of European law SOLVIT of the European Commission may be the better address. Also Petitions may be directed to the various Parliaments.
Ombudsman usefulness (arebenti)
The scheme goes like this:
a) You have to ask the EU institution first and get an official reply. I.e. write letters to the Council and get a reply. Lu presidency possibly.
b) you write a complaint about formal procedural failure to the EU ombudsman.
The person who does this needs to study the Rules Of Procedure and what happened at the Council on Monday. Documentation is not good yet. Please document your findings, so others can step into it. We do not overestimate this channel. Euroombudsman ist just one channel we can and shall use. It is a 1-3 persons project and please do not discuss outside this page whether EuroOmbudsman has powers and is useful and so on, we did it several times, these discussions just waste our time and distract us from doing our tasks. The strategy is permanent penetration and what does not harm will do good. All findings and discussions shall be documented at the associated kwiki page, so we do not have to repeat it again and again.
scope:
Anybody can complain to the Ombudsman about maladministration in the activities of the institutions and bodies of the European Union.
Examples:
- administrative irregularities
- unfairness
- discrimination
- abuse of power
- failure to reply
- refusal of information
- unnecessary delay
From a phone conversations of phm with Ombudsman office:
- investigate rule breaches of administrative organs
- did the Council's secretariat hides a document that it should have disclosed?
- did CEC Internal Market (preferably lower officials, not Bolkestein) violate their duties?
- produce paperwork for one case 3 months after submission, handle next case later
- give a judgment and a recommendation to the administrative organ
- ask this organ to take certain measures, sollicit reply
- ask the European Parliament to further pursue the case
out of scope:
investigate political malpractise (e.g. lies of Bolkestein, inadequacy of national handling of Council representation)
requirements for complaint:
- You must already have contacted the institution or body concerned, for example by a letter.
- Complete documentation
- Only one case at once (otherwise a new case must be reopened, with new waiting periods)
Articles 2.4 and 2.8 of the Statute of the Ombudsman require that a complaint to the Ombudsman must be preceded by appropriate administrative approaches, to give Community Institutions the opportunity to resolve problems itself, before the European Ombudsman becomes involved.
power:
If the attempt at conciliation fails, the Ombudsman can make recommendations to solve the case. If the institution does not accept his recommendations, he can make a special report to the European Parliament.
Investigation power (Excerpt http://www.euro-ombudsman.eu.int/lbasis/en/provis.htm )
Subject to the conditions laid down in the Statute, the Ombudsman may require Community institutions and bodies and the authorities of Member States to supply, within a reasonable time, information or documents for the purposes of an inquiry.
The Ombudsman may inspect the file of the Community institution concerned in order to verify the accuracy and completeness of its replies. The Ombudsman may take copies of the whole file or of specific documents contained in the file. The Ombudsman informs the complainant that an inspection has taken place.
The Ombudsman may require officials or other servants of Community institutions or bodies to give evidence under the conditions laid down in the Statute.
Illustrative figures
These are only highlights, not complete.
workload:
In 2000 - 2003, 8419 cases have been examined. About 30% were within the mandate of the Ombudsman. An inquiry was initiated in 909 cases.
Number of cases per institution: CEC 699, EP 82, Council of the European Union 33, and others.
timeframes:
The Ombudsman dealt with 1101 inquiries since 01.01.2000 (909 were initiated during this period, and 192 were brought from 1999). 917 inquiries were closed by 31.12.2003 (of which 13 own initiative inquiries). Inquiries were closed for one or more of the following reasons:
- 270 cases were settled by the institution after the Ombudsman had opened an inquiry
- in 18 cases the complainant withdrew the complaint;
- no maladministration was found in 441 cases (of which 10 own initiative inquiries);
- in 13 cases the Ombudsman achieved a friendly solution;
- 121 inquiries were closed with a critical remark to the institution concerned;
- 45 inquiries resulted in draft recommendations;
- since 01.01.2000,
- the body accepted the recommendations of the European Ombudsman in 37 cases (of which 1 own initiative).
- 4 cases in which a draft recommendation was made were later closed with a critical remark.
- In 6 other cases, the Ombudsman presented a special report to the European Parliament.
- The European Parliament has subsequently adopted resolutions supporting the Ombudsman's conclusions and recommendations in all of these cases.
When the EOM receives a complaint, he sends it to the institution or body concerned, asking for its opinion on the complaint within two months.
*If the Ombudsman considers it appropriate to do so, he may take steps to ensure that a complaint is dealt with as a matter of priority.*
Legal
Contact
complaint by letter, preferably the online available pdf form.
- FR 67001 Strasbourg Cedex / Avenue du Président Robert Schuman 1 (B.P. 403)
- Fon: +33 (0)388172313
- Nicholas Catephores, Assistant Tel.: +33 (0) 623210391
- Fax: +33 (0)38817906(2)
- mail: euro-ombudsman at europarl eu int
The ombudsman is also present and represented in Bruxles.
Possible maladministration issues of CEC and Council
- translation
problems of consolidated Parlament's directive. In German translation article 3 is a mistranslation (data-processing --> Datenschutz)
- Parliament's version untranslated to many EU member state languages
- misconduct at the Council session
- surprise attack with DE-Bolkestein "compromise"
- bullying of danish representative by Irish presidency
- no time given to Eastern Europeans, failure to ask for their positions
- asking first for abstention rather than first for agreement
- Bolkestein lies about directive contents at Council session
- surprise attack with DE-Bolkestein "compromise"
- misconduct by the Council before the session
- failure to disclose documents
- misinformation about proposal
- deceptive langauge of the proposal
ignoring the work of the Parliament's Plenary & CULT & ITRE, Committee of Regions and the Economic and Social Committee, concealing this fact from ministers
phrases of the form "software is not patentable unless condition which can always be made true"
- participation of patent administrators only, not backed by any elected legislature, misunderstood by ministers
- attempt to interfere before it was their turn in the procedure
- misconduct by DG Internal Market before the session
- false claim that "overall balance is maintained", used to gain acceptance for program claims by DG Infosoc
misleading governments by secret nitpicking on Europarl amendments
- threats to withdraw directive from the EU and let EPO decide alone
- concerted attempts to misinform the press about contents of proposals
Intellectual Property Institute study scam
- locking away of the study for half a year
- Ischia conference 2003/10: Economics expertise from patent lawyers only
- initial greenbook consultations with patent lawyers only
- Translation problems of Council directive
- Misinformation of Poland about council rules by NL presidency
