56 | Annual Report 2019 In addition, the Ombudsman agreed that all the documents of the Finance Committee could be considered to be part of the case concerning legislation, and in the Ombudsman’s opinion this was also true of the documents of the Ministry for Economic Affairs and the Interior. In reaching this conclusion, the Ombudsman gave weight to, among other things, the documents having a direct and close connection, including in terms of time, with the work carried out by the Finance Committee. 2019-29. When children are consulted as parties to a case, it must be done in a manner to enable them to understand what the case concerns The National Social Appeals Board received an anonymous notification of concern about the well-being of two children. Because of uncertainty about who the children’s mother was, the Board called her employer to confirm her identity. In connection with its processing of the case, the Board sent the two children consultation letters with documents from the case. The children were 12 and 14 years old, respectively, and the 12-year-old child had a diagnosis of atypical autism. The Ombudsman found that he could not criticise that, in cases of notifications of concern about children, the National Social Appeals Board as a general rule consults not only the holders of parental responsibility as parties to the case but, in the absence of special circumstances, also children aged 12 or over. The Ombudsman therefore found no grounds for criticising the Board’s assessment that the 14-yearold girl could be consulted. With regard to the 12-year-old boy, the Ombudsman was of the opinion that he did not have sufficient grounds for criticising the Board’s assessment that he could be consulted. However, in the Ombudsman’s opinion the way in which the Board had conducted the consultation of the children had not made it sufficiently clear to them what the case concerned and on which information the Board wanted the children’s comments. The Ombudsman added that in his opinion the consultation had been conducted in an undesirable way which was not considerate towards the children. In addition, the Ombudsman stated that in his opinion he did not have a sufficient basis for criticising that the Board chose to call the employer whose name was stated in the notification in order to confirm the mother’s identity. However, the Ombudsman was of the opinion that the Board’s notes from the telephone conversation should have stated to whom the Board had spoken and which specific information had been passed on during the conversation. Further, the Ombudsman found that he could not criticise that the National Social Appeals Board processed the anonymous notification instead of forwarding the case to the municipality, which had not previously received any notifications about the family. 2019-32. No redress despite inadequate guidance on tax-free bonus by unemployment insurance fund A woman applied to her unemployment insurance fund for a tax-free bonus, for which members of an unemployment insurance fund may be eligible if they postpone voluntary early retirement and continue working. The woman had continued working beyond the age at which she became eligible for voluntary early retirement – at first as a part-time wage earner for just over two years and then as an assisting spouse in her husband’s firm. The unemployment insurance fund and the appeals bodies refused the woman’s application for a tax-free bonus because she did not meet the requirement on the number of hours worked: she had not worked a sufficient number of hours in her part-time job, and because she was part-time insured against unemployment, the number of hours which she had worked in her husband’s firm did not count.