CBC;
The probe into a breach of policy at Saskatchewan’s social services department has become an RCMP investigation of what may be, if proven, the biggest fraud ever perpetrated on the province.
Note to CBC: See Spudco.
While no charges have been laid, police raided Evelyn Hynes’ office, seized files and a computer. Government sources admit nearly a million dollars is unaccounted for.
Hynes was convicted of defrauding a bank in Newfoundland in the 1980s for more than $600,000. Working as an assistant loans manager, she made up phony clients and bogus loans over six years. She was sentenced to two years in jail but was later pardoned.
After getting out of jail and becoming a social worker she moved to Saskatoon, rising through the ranks of the provincial government to become a middle-level manager. But government officials didn’t check Hynes’s criminal record when they hired her in 1989. At that time, she had not been pardoned.
Eh… would someone please ask how the pardon came about?
Update –
Both Ms. Hynes and her husband, Grant Matheson were employed in the same office with the Benefits and Audit Program and left on the same day. Both were on salary at over $80,000 a year. Escorted from their offices in December, the department has been under a “no talk” order ever since. Quote from a source: “DCRE usually eat their own rather than proscecute them.”
As so often happens in these cases, the irony positively drips. Hynes also enjoyed a second paying position, teaching classes at the University of Saskatchewan in poverty. Former President of the Saskatchewan Social Workers Association, her work on “Social Work Ethics and Income Security” was adopted by that association. (Someone may want to be checking over the books there as well.)
Considering that social assistance recipients in Saskatchewan have even the most trivial overpayment of funds corrected by docking from their future disbursements, regardless of the hardship it may cause – it will be interesting to see what the NDP government does with Ms. Hynes pension plan.
The NDP’s claimed drop in welfare caseloads would do an Enron accountant proud – by creating new program names, they shuffle clients into new check-recieiving categories that bypass the field worker and go directly through SaskTel.
One such example is the Saskatchewan employment supplement, a support system for the working poor. Once under the umbrella of the welfare system, recipients now report income to a call center on a monthly basis, via 1-800 number, and recieve their income top-up. To apply for welfare in Saskatchewan you dial a 1 800 number, apply for a “transitional employment allowance” – meaning you just want some money until you can find a job – and the government will simply cut you a check.
There is no social services interview or other system in place to prevent abuse, as it’s considered too costly to do so.
Apparently, the same applies to Department of Community Resources and Employment managers.
Ain’t gov’t human resources departments the best? Vetting,schmetting! We believe in second chances, and screw the taxpayer…it’s only money.
Don’t you have Gov’t Auditors? Oh wait, we have them here in B.C. also, which didn’t prevent OR CATCH the recent sticky fingered Gov’t bureaucrats out here. If it weren’t for hawkeyed journalists, they’d still be making my wallet lighter.
I got more coming. Watch for the update.
Good grief – just when I thought my day couldnt get any better. The money keeps flying out the windows.
I actually worked for Spudco and made lots and lots of money. They offered me a full time job, but I saw the writing on the wall and went off to join another Government operation.
At that time, they tried to get too big too fast inorder to impress McCain’s, who where in the market to built a plant out west. I believe the southern Alberta got the plant and we were left with lots of big metal bins and contracts with the farmers to grow potatoes.
It’s the socialist mentality that exists in Saskatchewan and the NDP governments belief that only social workers are the pinnacle of academic knowledge and education that is the greater problem.
Instead of employing trained professionals in a specific area of study such as mental health or probations, the Province’s solution to all of its ills is to put social workers in charge of ALL departments that deal with health, justice and social services.
I am an educated criminologist with a post grad degree from the finest university in the World, and after 3 years of being told that my qualifications weren’t needed in the province with the highest level of crime, I left. It’s crap, but I have to admit that I am now enjoying the opportunity to sit back and watch the politics.
There is no adherence to the Social Workers Code of Ethics either. Where else in this country can a provincially employed social worker also have a position as a director of a private group home at the same time? Can you say conflict of interest, DL of BH Inc.? It was brought to the attention of the head of the department that oversees licensing in 2003, but like most of his ilk, has his thumb up his ass and does nothing.
The only saving grace is that most of the social work graduates in Saskatchewan have their degrees from “clown college” (University of Regina).
Hey Calvert….you’re doing it all wrong!!