Children’s Ombudsman launches free-phone complaints line

VULNERABLE children and their parents and guardians can now contact the Ombudsman for Children’s Office for free to make a complaint about the services affecting them.

The office has received a growing number of calls since it was established in 2004, prompting moves to switch its complaints system from a pay service to a no-cost system.

Of the more than 2,000 complaints made to the office in the past four years, the majority have come from parents and extended family members on behalf of a child. In a minority of cases children themselves have made contact.