Extracts from news published on the Ombudsman’s website in 2018 | 105 7 November Serious errors in cases about returns of children in care outside their home Before a municipality can return children who have been placed in care outside their home to their parents, it must fulfil a number of case processing requirements. The purpose of this is to safeguard the best interests of the children to the greatest extent possible. On being informed about the ‘Action Plan for Economic Stabilisation of Family Sector 2.0’ of Randers Municipality, the Ombudsman carried out an investigation of four randomly selected cases about returns of children and young people who had been placed in care outside their home by the municipality. The Ombudsman’s investigation shows that in all four cases, serious errors were committed in relation to the child or young person. initiatives will result in real improvements in processing times from the turn of the year, the Ministry of Justice writes to the Parliamentary Ombudsman. 20 December Children at Departure Centre Sjælsmark living under difficult conditions The conditions for children at Departure Centre Sjælsmark are liable to make their childhood substantially more difficult and to restrict their possibilities of a natural development and self-realisation considerably. This is the Ombudsman’s conclusion based on unannounced visits to the centre. He says, among other things, that the children’s everyday life appears to be characterised to an appreciable extent by anxiety, loneliness and feelings of unpredictability.  21 December 26 November Death leads to initiatives by Prison and Probation Service Single parents increasingly have to wait for child support payments due to them. The Ombudsman has investigated a case of a man dying in January 2016 in the Herstedvester prison shortly after having been detained in Vridsløselille, a facility for foreign nationals detained under the Aliens Act. The case has been covered by the media. Consequences for affected children of development in collection of child support payments are very worrying … This is contrary to the expectations about which the then Danish Customs and Tax Administration (SKAT) informed the Ombudsman in 2016. 28 November Ministry of Justice promises faster replies to requests for access to documents or information For an extended period of time, the Ministry of Justice has had difficulty meeting the requirements set out in the Access to Public Administration Files Act and the explanatory notes to the Act on processing times in cases about access to documents or information. However, it is anticipated that a number of specific Following an internal investigation of the case, the Prison and Probation Service informed the Ombudsman that it had concluded that a number of errors had been made in connection with the man’s detention in Vridsløselille. On that basis, the Prison and Probation Service has now implemented a number of measures to prevent the same errors occurring again. All news stories can be read in full (in Danish) at www.ombudsmanden.dk.