THE OMBUDSMAN ANNUAL REPORT 31 for the year 2004
Published: 2005
The Thirty-First Report of the Ombudsman, selected parts of which appear in this
report, deals with decisions reached by my predecessor, Justice Eliezer Goldberg.
This report was placed on the table of the Knesset in March 2005 and I was appointed
State Comptroller and Ombudsman in June 2005.
The Office of the Ombudsman investigates annually some 7,000 complaints received
from every stratum of society. This phenomenon attests to the confidence placed in
the Ombudsman by the general public. My aim as Ombudsman is to increase
awareness in the existence of the Ombudsman institution, particularly among the
weaker classes of society – new immigrants, distressed classes, minorities and the
elderly.
The Ombudsman is very accessible. Any person can file a complaint with the
Ombudsman; a complaint may be written in any language, not necessarily in Hebrew.
It is also possible to file a complaint via the internet or through one of the branch
offices in Jerusalem, Tel Aviv and Haifa, and in the future also in Nazareth and Beer
Sheva. The service provided by the Ombudsman is free of charge.
The independence of the Ombudsman institution and its meticulousness in treating the
individual's matter as its foremost concern are designed to rectify injustices caused to
the complainant and to improve the functioning of public administration in its
relations with those requiring its services. The expansion of the public apparatus
creates a dependency of the individual on this apparatus in a large number of areas
and the Ombudsman provides the "small citizen" with an address to which he can turn
and seek a remedy in cases where he encounters improper activities of the
administration.
Some of the cases in which the Ombudsman brought about a rectification of defects
are detailed in this report.
Micha Lindenstrauss
State Comptroller
and Ombudsman
Jerusalem, 2005