If I tell you the overarching Ombudsman Law is a much better option than the two present separate Office of the Information Commissioner and Office of the Complaints Commissioner – it is! And this Ombudsman, whoever he/she will be will also rule on Public Complaints made against the Royal Cayman Islands Police Service (RCIPS). That even makes it better! You MUST take my word for it!

If scientists and astronauts (the latter have been to space and looked down on our world) tell you the world is not flat but round you must take no notice of them.

That is exactly the wisdom of our government who have been told by THREE of the Commissioners who headed up Information and Complaints that combining both offices was a very bad idea. And lumping in Police Complaints was making a bad situation even worse.

The main reason given for this unwise move was to save costs and improve efficiency as outlined in the much ignored EY report. It showed, however, the savings as perceived were minimal, although by adding the third entity into the mix suddenly put the costs up considerably.

There has been no explanation as to how much better for all of us this is going to be except the phrase “one stop shop”.

If you want to make something more efficient, lump it together and add something else to it. That is according to government.

Both the Office of the Information Commissioner and Office of the Complaints Commissioner (OCC) were already efficient and working with minimal staff. They were able to get under the nose of government officials, and those of large companies, and make them accountable – or actually try to make them accountable. Where they did score was showing to the public just how government departments were inefficient and how they went to costly means to delay answering the commissioners searching questions.

When a Commissioner’s ruling went against the Governor’s office something had to be done.

Instead of merging the Police Complaints with the OCC (that really would have saved costs) government can hide the real reason for the Ombudsman and brandish statements like the one Acting Commissioner of Police Anthony Ennis (who is part of the project team) said, “By establishing an independent office that is accountable only to parliament to deal with public complaints against the police, we believe this project will assure the public of objective, unbiased investigation of complaints.”
I agree with him but it doesn’t answer the question why do we need an Ombudsman One Stop Shop?

I am telling you the One Stop Shop is best and that’s a fact. It is!

If you say so …..