Tony King was appointed Pensions Ombudsman with effect from 1 September 2007. From June 2003 until taking up his present post he was an ombudsman in the Financial Ombudsman Service - latterly Lead Ombudsman for Pensions and Securities. Before that he had been Casework Director in the Office of the Pensions Ombudsman, the office to which he has returned.
Tony has a grounding (now distant) in the pensions industry, having spent the first 18 years of his career in a variety of administration, trusteeship and consulting roles.
Born in 1949, Tom moved to Belfast as an eleven year-old from his native Limerick. He studied at St Mary's Grammar School in Belfast and graduated from Trinity College, Dublin in 1971.
Following graduation in 1971 he joined the National Health Service as a Graduate Trainee. In 1973 he was appointed Unit Administrator at the Ulster Hospital, Dundonald and his career in the health service later took him to North and West Belfast and Lisburn.
In 1981 he became Chief Administrative Officer in the Western Health and Social Services Board, at the age of 31 the youngest person in the UK to be appointed to such a post, and in 1985, following the implementation of the Griffiths Report, he was appointed as the Board's General Manager.
In September 2000 Tom Frawley became the Assembly Ombudsman and Northern Ireland Commissioner for Complaints. In 2001, as Ombudsman, the Standards and Privileges Committee of the Assembly asked that he become the interim Commissioner for Standards at the Assembly.
In 2008 Tom was awarded a CBE in the New Year Honours List.
Tom has a keen interest in public and current affairs and in outdoor activities generally but especially rugby and gaelic football, both of which he has played in the past. He lives in Derry with his wife Marie and Rachel, Joseph and Daniel.
Christopher Hamer took up his post as Ombudsman for Estate Agents in December 2006. His career prior to that has seen him as Private Secretary to the Parliamentary Commissioner, as Director of Services at the Insurance Ombudsman Bureau and General Manager at the Personal Investment Authority Ombudsman Bureau. Immediately before taking up his position as Ombudsman he was in a global compliance role with a major international bank. His current role is to resolve disputes between buyers, sellers, renters or landlords of residential property in the UK and Agents. He also has a responsibility to contribute towards establishing best practice in the property agency sector.
In March 2007 the scheme was the first redress scheme approved by the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry under the Housing Act 2004 in relation to disputes arising from the distribution of Home Information Packs; and the first scheme to be authorised under the Consumer Estate Agents and Redress Act 2007, which requires all Estate Agents in the UK to be a member of an Approved Redress Scheme.
With effect from 1 May 2009, the scheme was renamed as The Property Ombudsman to reflect the broader jurisdiction of dealing with sales, lettings, commercial and UK based international agents.
Jane Hingston began her career in alternative dispute resolution with a move in 1991 from her previous career in the Building Societies movement, to the Office of the Banking Ombudsman, eventually becoming an Assistant Ombudsman.
When the United Kingdom financial ombudsman schemes were brought together in 2000 under the umbrella of the Financial Ombudsman Service, Jane was appointed to the ombudsman panel – and also served as joint Building Societies Ombudsman during the transitional period.
In 2005, Jane was appointed Lead Ombudsman for banking and credit – an area that covers a wide cross-section of financial businesses including all standard consumer credit licence holders in the United Kingdom.
Jane has taken an active interest in OA since its inception, and was elected to the Executive Committee in May 2009.
Dr Jane Martin was confirmed as Chair of the Commission for Local Administration in England in April 2012. She was appointed to the post of Local Government Ombudsman and Vice-chair of the Commission for Local Administration in England in January 2010. Between November 2010 to April 2012 she was Acting Chair following the retirement of Sir Tony Redmond. She has extensive knowledge and experience of public service delivery. At the University of Birmingham and Warwick Business School she conducted research on public management and governance in the fields of education, health and local government. She has worked in local authorities across England as a consultant for the Improvement and Development Agency for Local Government (IDeA) and was the first Executive Director of the Centre for Public Scrutiny. Prior to joining LGO she was Deputy Chief Executive at the Local Better Regulation Office and a Non-executive Director of Coventry Primary Care Trust.
Dame Julie Thérèse Mellor, DBE was appointed as Parliamentary Commissioner for Administration and the Health Service Commissioner for England (Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman) on 3 January 2012. She was formerly the chair of the Equal Opportunities Commission between 1999 and 2005.
Dame Julie was a partner at PricewaterhouseCoopers and a non executive board member of both the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills and of the Green Alliance. She is former chair of the Employers' Forum on Disability and of the Fatherhood Institute. She is a former board member of the Commission for Racial Equality and the National Consumer Council.
Prior to her appointment as Chair of the Equal Opportunities Commission, Dame Julie was Corporate Human Resources Director for British Gas and has 20 years experience of human resources management in a wide range of environments, from the Greater London Council to Shell and TSB.
In 2006, Julie Mellor was made a Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire (DBE) for services to equal opportunities.
Lewis Shand Smith became the Chief Ombudsman for Ombudsman Services in 2009. Previously he was the Crown appointed Deputy Ombudsman and a member of the Executive Board at the Scottish Public Services Ombudsman (SPSO).
He is a priest in the Scottish Episcopal church and has served several congregations in Motherwell, Shetland and Dumfries. He was a Canon of St Andrew’s cathedral in Aberdeen.
Lewis is responsible for the operation of four ombudsman schemes: Communications, approved by Ofcom; Energy, approved by Ofgem; Property approved by the OFT as an estate agents redress scheme and by RICS and ARMA to handle complaints about their members. And, Copyright Licensing, to handle complaints from the members and licensees of PRS for Music.
These schemes were brought within the single brand ‘Ombudsman Services’ in 2011 to more accurately reflect the range of consumer ombudsman schemes provided by the company.
Paul Kenny was appointed as Ireland’s first Pensions Ombudsman in 2003 and reappointed in 2009. He has been involved in pensions for 42 years, almost 35 of which were spent with Irish Pensions Trust, later part of Mercer. He was a Director of the Retirement Planning Council of Ireland for ten years and its Chairman for three years. He is a Fellow of the Pensions Management Institute and was a founder Fellow of the Irish Institute of Pensions Management. He has served on the OA Executive Committee since 2008 and lately chaired its Governance working group. Married, with three grown-up children, a dog and a cat.
William Prasifka took up his position as Financial Services Ombudsman in March 2010. William has extensive experience as a public servant and as a lawyer in private practice.
Prior to taking up the post of Financial Services Ombudsman, William held the position of Chairperson of the Competition Authority, from 2006 to 2010 and was Commissioner for Aviation Regulation, from 1999 to 2006. Between 1996 and 1999 he was a Member of the Competition Authority.
Before entering the public sector, William worked as a lawyer in the private sector, in both Dublin and New York, where his work was predominantly in the areas of competition law, antitrust law, corporate finance, mergers and acquisitions. During his term as Chairperson of the Competition Authority William was also a member of the board of the National Consumer Agency and the National Competitiveness Council. He also spent eight years on the Board of the Irish Fulbright Commission, four years as Deputy Chairperson.
Away from his public roles William is President of the Irish Czech and Slovak Society.
Judy Clements was appointed to the office of The Adjudicator for Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs, the Valuation Office Agency and The Insolvency Service in April 2009. Judy is the third Adjudicator in the role’s nineteen year history. Her remit is to investigate complaints against the departments where they have failed to resolve them satisfactorily with the complainant.
Judy has over 25 years experience in the public sector. Prior to her current role Judy was a Director at the Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC). She spent the previous four years at HM Prison Service as Head of Diversity and Equality. Judy was a Member of the Home Secretary’s Lawrence Steering Group. A former Chief Executive of Birmingham Partnership for Change 1995-1999, Judy was also Chair of The Diana Princess of Wales NHS Children’s Hospital Trust in Birmingham (1997-1999). Judy is a member of the Women in Public Policy, Whitehall network. She is a former Trustee of Turning Point, one of the UK’s leading social care charities, and is currently Non-Executive Vice Chair of Barnardo’s UK Children’s charity. She has recently been appointed as an independent adviser to Victim Support’s Equality, Diversity and Inclusion Committee.
Elizabeth is Independent Complaints Reviewer for Land Registry and also a partner in the Independent Complaint Resolution Service (ICRS) which provides complaint review services for the Solicitors Regulation Authority and the Pension Protection Fund. From 2002 to 2008 she was Independent Complaints Adjudicator for Ofsted.
Her early career was in criminal and family law. More recently she has served as a board member in the NHS, the Probation Service and a number of not for profit organisations, and has worked as a consumer representative, a courts inspector and as an independent member of the Parole Board. She is currently a member of the Disciplinary Panel of the Chartered Institute of Public Finance Accountants (CIPFA).
Ian Pattison’s first career for 20 years was in the Army. On leaving in 1984, he took a number of managerial and administrative roles in the law and consulting, as well as 8 years with the Banking Ombudsman, moving briefly into the Financial Ombudsman Service on the merger of several separate Ombudsman schemes operating in the financial services industry.
He took up his present position as OA Secretary in 2005 on the retirement after 12 years of the first Secretary, Gordon Adams.
