The Danish Parliamentarian Ombudsman, Jørgen Steen Sørensen, paid an official visit to China. During the visit the Ombudsman signed cooperation agreements with the Ministry of Supervision and the State Bureau of Letters and Calls and met with Huang Shuxian, Minister of Ministry of Supervision and Shu Xiaoqin, director of State Bureau of Letters and Calls.
“It is very exciting and through cooperation with our Chinese partners we hope to contribute to the development of their public administration, also with a focus on fighting corruption”, the Danish Parliamentarian Ombudsman, Jørgen Steen Sørensen, says.
The two signed cooperation agreements with the Ministry of Supervision and the State Bureau for Letters and Calls responsible for the supervision of public authorities and the processing of complaints and suggestions from citizens respectively.
“I wish to stress that we have no intention of exporting the model of the Danish Ombudsman institution to China. The Chinese model is very different from the Danish one, and it would not be possible. But we have agreed on co-organizing seminars and workshops and on developing standards for Chinese civil servants, Jørgen Steen Sørensen explains.
The agreement has been prepared as a result of on-going contacts through a ten year period. Once again in the autumn 2012, a Chinese delegation visited Denmark, which lead to the recently completed visit to China, where the Ombudsman held a range of meetings with high-level officials and politicians.
“The Chinese are clear about their wish to fight corruption in China. They are curious about how we manage to sustain such a high degree of ethics in the Danish public administration, which to a great extent can explain why we barely know of corruption in Denmark. We cannot tell them what to do. But we can engage in a dialogue and explain what we have done, Jørgen Steen Sørensen says.
During the visit to China, the Ombudsman visited two large educational institutions for civil servants. At one of them, the China Academy of Discipline Inspection and Supervision, he gave a lecture on the Ombudsman model of Scandinavia and the tasks and working methods of the Danish Ombudsman institution.
The cooperation agreement is drafted in broad and general terms, and in the near future the institutions will start planning the further cooperation, including defining the exact themes of cooperation and time schedules.
“I am hoping for a close and constructive cooperation in the coming years for the benefit of all sides”, Jørgen Steen Sørensen says.
