In 2021, the Parliamentary Ombudsman received a record 7,732 complaints. This is around 700 complaints more than in 2020 (7,059), which was also a record year for complaints. The amount of complaints has increased with more than 38% during the last three years.

Case numbers rose in nearly all administrative branches. The largest number of complaints concerned health care (1,322), social welfare (1,142) and the police (922). The strongest growth was observed in complaints related to health care. In 2021, 1,322 complaints related to the health care administrative branch were received, compared to 802 the previous year. This means a growth of almost 65%.

The Ombudsman also issued 155 statements, which is again a record number. The Ombudsman also took 67 own initiatives.

Due to the coronavirus pandemic the number of inspections was lower than usually, with only 39 inspections carried out, mainly using remote access.

Despite the heavy increase in complaints the Ombudsman resolved a total of 7,892 complaints (7,027 in 2020) and 91 (78) of his own initiatives during the past year. A total of 1,030 complaints and 42 own-initiative investigations, more than 13% of all complaints, led to measures taken by the Ombudsman.

Corona pandemic-related complaints and own-initiative investigations

The Parliamentary Ombudsman received a total of 1106 complaints related to the coronavirus pandemic, 1065 of which were resolved in 2021. The Ombudsman took 14 own initiatives and issued 2 statements related to the coronavirus pandemic.

- 2021 was again a very exceptional year with regard to the Ombudsman’s activities due to the strong increase in complaints and the coronavirus pandemic,” says Parliamentary Ombudsman Petri Jääskeläinen.

However, the office was able to achieve the time target for processing complaints at the end of the year, when there were no complaints pending that had been submitted more than one year ago.

For further information, please contact Information Officer Citha Dahl, citha.dahl@eduskunta.fi.