Following surprise visits made to homes for the elderly, the Parliamentary Secretariat for the Elderly will be launching a telephone line and e-mail address to which people can file complaints.

The team handling the grievances will compile a report about improvements that need to be carried out in each home.

The telephone number and e-mail address are still to be announced.

The statement from the secretariat follows unannounced visits to homes for the elderly by Parliamentary Secretary Justyne Caruana, including one in Msida, where she found several shortcomings.

Earlier this year a set of minimum standards for care homes for the elderly was launched for pubic consultation and feedback is still being collected.

These standards include drawing up individual care plans for the residentsand offering three full meals a day with varied menus.

Following the public consultation, the standards will be embedded within the law and apply to all the 37 government, Church and private homes that currently house more than 4,000 elderly people. Meanwhile, Parliamentary Secretary Chris Fearne also carried out a surprise inspection yesterday – this time of catering services at Mater Dei Hospital following a number of complaints.

The visit was unannounced and not even his staff knew about it, a spokeswoman said.

Dr Fearne visited some wards, inspected the food and spoke to patients about the service.

In a tweet he said that the feedback he received about the service was good, however there was room for improvement.

During his visit he urged nurses to file complaints they received from patients, because criticism published on social media was not reflecting the number of formal complaints.

The feedback he received from the patients included comments that the service had improved over the past few days.

The spokeswoman added that this was the first spot check of the sort, and the Secretariat was not excluding similar visits in the future.