ANNUAL REPORT OF 2019 ON THE ACTIVITIES OF THE SEIMAS OMBUDSMEN’S OFFICE OF THE REPUBLIC OF LITHUANIA and Vocational Training Development Centre and the Centre for Quality Assessment in Higher Education, which when organising the preparation of professional standards and modular vocational training programmes and expert examination of preparation for the implementation of formal vocational training programmes and implementation of relevant projects will take into account the recommendations made by the Seimas Ombudsman. The Ministry of Health informed the Seimas Ombudsman about the launch of two new qualification improvement programmes covering topics related to the protection of the rights of a patient with mental and behavioural disorders, and covered the legal bases for the management of aggressive and violent behaviour in health care. In addition to physicians and nurses working in psychiatry, nurse assistants also have access to knowledge under these programmes. The MSSL stated in its respose to the Seimas Ombudsman that, taking into account the recommendations of the Seimas Ombudsmen, the MSSL will organise the meeting of representatives of the institutions concerned to discuss the amendments to legal acts regulating the improvement of professional competence of social services workers and the drawing up of programmes including in them the topics related to the protection of human rights. Accordingly, the Department of Social Services Supervision informed that it would submit proposals to the Ministry of Social Security and Labour to supplement the description of the procedure for improving the professional competence of employees in the field of social services, providing for the mandatory inclusion of subjects related to human rights in the introductory programmes. During the transitional period pending the amendment of that legislation, the Department will also recommend that institutions include human rights topics in those programmes. EVERYONE COUNTS 19 Investigation into the fundamental human rights problems concerning the review of decisions following which persons, before 1 January 2016, were declared to be legally incapacitated and possibly unjustified restriction of such persons’ rights The Seimas Ombudsman launched the investigation into the fundamental human rights problems concerning the review of decisions following which persons, before 1 January 2016, were declared to be legally incapacitated and possibly unjustified restriction of such persons’ rights8. During the investigation the Seimas Ombudsman considered whether provisions of Article 72(2) of the Law Amending the Civil Code stipulating that court rulings following which persons were declared to be legally incapacitated passed by 1 January 2016 must be reviewed within two years from the date of entry into force of this Law, i.e. by 1 January 2018, were properly implemented and clarified the possible reasons for the misapplication of the above referred provisions. The investigation found that although the proper implementation of the provisions of Article 72(2) of the Law Amending the Civil Code was one of the key preconditions for reducing the suffering of a person as a result of severe interference with the person’s right to private life, only less than half of the court rulings passed before 1 January 2016 following which persons were declared to be legally incapacitated were revised within the time limit provided for by law, i.e. by 1 January 2018. In view of the fact that, under the new legal regulation, the institute of complete legal incapacity has been amended to allow a person to be declared to be 8 The Seimas Ombudsman’s Report on the investigation into the fundamental human rights problems concerning the review of decisions following which persons, before 1 January 2016, were declared to be legally incapacitated and possibly unjustified restriction of such persons’ rights, No NŽTI-2018/1-1, 23 December 2019