At a Regional Board meeting in Vienna in October 2014, it was agreed that the a proposal should be put to all Voting members to amend the Rules of the European Region of the IOI to allow for the election of a Regional Vice-President.

Jorge Cardona, the Spanish member of the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child visited the headquarters of the Ombudsman.

Mr Wayne Lines has recently been appointed as the South Australian Ombudsman (effective from 18 December 2014). Mr Lines is just the sixth Ombudsman appointed since the establishment of the Office of the Ombudsman in 1972.

Acting upon the directions by the Federal Ombudsman (Wafaqi Mohtasib) of Pakistan, the Pakistan International Airline (PIA) reimbursed an amount of Rs. 80,820/- that was extra charged by the department from a passenger travelling from Pakistan to the United Kingdom.

On 29 December 2014 based on the results of examination of two years of activities of the Ukrainian Parliament Commissioner for Human Rights the Bureau of the International Coordination Committee of National Human Rights Institutions (ICC NHRI) has granted to the Commissioner for Human Rights the “A” status - the highest status of compliance with the UN Paris Principles.

In its efforts to further increase the regional impact of the IOI, the members of the IOI Board of Directors decided at the Annual Board Meeting in Vienna to continue the regional subsidy programme for the membership year 2014/2015.

A research by the European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights (FRA) examines support service provision for victims of crime across the 28 EU Member States, in line with the 2012 EU Victims’ Directive and focuses not on abstract fundamental rights standards but on the final practical results.

The Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman Service is today calling on past, present and future service users and the organisations it investigates to provide feedback on its service to help develop its service charter.