How reliable/fair are local Government Ombudsman's Investigations

Dear Local Government Ombudsmen,

Please can you provide me with the following information under the
Freedom Of Information Act 2000:-

1. Explanation of all the steps that the local government ombudsman
takes to verify and ensure that information received from council
officers are accurate/true.

2. The criteria your organisation use to decide whether or not
statements made by council officers are true or false.

3. The criteria your organisation use to decide whether or not
statements made by complainants are true or false.

4. The characteristics of things that your organisation consider to
be concrete evidence that a council officer has lied or made false
statements.

5. Whether or not maladministration includes situations when there
is evidence that council officers have told lies or made false
statements.

5. What your organisation does when it is presented with concrete
evidence that council officers) had lied or made false statements
about:

a. a complainant

b. a situation/event.

6. What your office does when it finds that a council officer has
told lies or made false statements about:

a. council employee(s)

b. Camden resident(s)

c. Council tenant(s)

7 The distinguishes between telling lies and giving out false
information about:

a. individuals

b. the council(s)

c. events/situations.

I would be grateful if you could send me your full reply within the
usual 20 days time limit.

Yours faithfully,

Theresa Ezekpo

Dear Foi Officer,

Thank you for your reply and for referring me to information on
your website.

However, after examining the information that you had referred me
to, I felt that I should clarify my request for the following
reasons:

The information on your website does not include those that I am
seeking from you and leads me to suspect that you may have
misunderstood my request;

The information on your website is generally about the types and
sources of information that you can obtain from the council;

My questions are essentially referring to the stage after the
ombudsman has obtained and examined information (ie various
documents and statements) from the council and hears that they are
incomplete and/or different from the information he/she had
obtained from the complainant;

My request is also asking for a clear definition, description and
illustrative examples of what the ombudsman would accept as
concrete evidence that a council officer has lied.

For example, what would the ombudsman accept as concrete proof that
the council has misinformed third parties including the ombudsman
by:

1. Supplying distorted/falsified information
(including documents, verbal or written statements) about a
complainant;

2. Removing, hiding or destroying pertinent information (including
documents, file notes, audio tapes, memos and/or emails) from the
complainant's files

I hope that this clarification of my request will help you to
identify and supply me with the information that I had requested
for.

Please feel free to ask me for further clarification of my request
if necessary.

If you are still not able or willing to supply the information that
I had requested for, then please confirm this within the next seven
days so that I can request for an internal review of your response.

I look forward to hearing from you soon.

Yours sincerely,

Theresa Ezekpo

Dear Foi Officer,

Thank you for your reply.

It is unfortunate that you are not able to give me the information
for which I had requested on this occasion.

Yours sincerely,

Theresa Ezekpo