Dominique Baudis, Rights Defender and Secretary General of the Association des Ombudsmans et Médiateurs de la Francophonie (AOMF), died on Thursday, April 10, in Paris.

NSW Ombudsman Bruce Barbour tabled two special reports in Parliament today. As Convenor of the NSW Child Death Review Team, the Ombudsman tabled a report on the research into the causes of death of children with a child protection history over a 10-year period 2002-2011.

Within a debate of the 26th Session of the Congress of the Local Authorities of the Council of Europe, the Catalan Ombudsman referred to some examples carried out by his Office regarding rights’ defence.

The current Victorian Ombudsman, Ms Deborah Glass OBE, was appointed in March 2014. The appointment is for a term of 10 years.

On 25 March the World Bank and the IOI organized a round table on „The Role of Ombudsman Offices in Promoting Good Governance and Effective Service Delivery“, held at the headquarters of the World Bank in Washington, DC. The IOI was represented at the discussions by its second Vice-President Diane Welborn and Secretary General Günther Kräuter.

On 1 April 2014, Mr Colin Neave was unanimously elected as the new Regional President of the IOI's Australasian and Pacific Region in the course of its Regional Board meeting, with immediate effect.

On Wednesday, 16 April 2014, a webinar on the role of Ombudsman institutions in advancing open government will take place and the IOI kindly invites all of its member institutions to join the webinar between 10 and 11 a.m. EST. The webinar is sponsored by Open Government Partnership (OGP), the World Bank Institute and the IOI and will aim to discuss the opportunities for Ombudsman offices to engage in their respective countries’ OGP processes.

The Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman is pleased to welcome the Local Government Ombudsman Dr Jane Martin to its unitary board to ensure closer working between the two organisations.