Username:
 Password:
 

Are you not a member?
Register here
Forgot your password?
 
 
 
 
 
 



NEWS > 29 November 2006

Other related articles:

UK: Allegations against police
A record number of allegations were made against the police in England and Wales last year, says the Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC).

Figures show there were 48,280 claims in 2007/08 - an increase of 5% on the previous year.

However the number of complaints - which can be made up of more than one allegation - has remained stable.

The Home Office says allegations have risen because people are becoming more aware of their rights.

Just under half of all allegations are either proved or resolved locally, through an apology or some other resol... Read more

 Article sourced from

Ottawa Citizen (subscription)
29 November 2006
This article appeared in the above title/site.
To view it in its entirity click this link.


Police, security agencies need

Federal policing and security agencies are ethically challenged from top to bottom, says the federal government's spending watchdog.

Aside from her scathing criticism of former football great Ron Stewart's tenure as federal ombudsman for prisoners -- which brought back memories of former privacy commissioner George Radwanski's fall from grace in 2003 -- Auditor General Sheila Fraser reveals doubts among the Mounties, border guards and prison guards that their co-workers would report spending abuses or even that they would be supported by their peers and bosses if they did.

"While ... the vast majority of public servants do adhere to high standards expected of them, senior management in each organization must support the reporting of misconduct by assuring confidentiality and taking any action warranted," a summary of the report said.

"Unfortunately in this report, I present a case in which a senior ... government appointee abused his position for substantial personal gain," Ms. Fraser said.

"What particularly disturbs me about these cases is that while only a few individuals were behaving improperly, others knew about it and failed to act on that knowledge. Further, senior management knew or should have known what was going on, but took no action."

After the report's release, Treasury Board President John Baird said the Conservative government is committed to acting on the complaints in the report and to cleaning up spending abuses, which he stressed occurred under the previous Liberal government.

The proposed federal accountability bill, which includes whistle-blower protection, will improve government control over how taxpayers' dollars are spent, Mr. Baird said.

Ms. Fraser's report noted that a survey found only about half the employees of the security agencies believed their bosses would act on reports of misconduct and many felt that whistleblowers were not respected.

Workers need to know their managers will follow up on their whistleblowing and protect their confidentiality, Ms. Fraser said.

Still, in a separate case, it was the complaints of employees that brought to light, and led to an investigation into, abuses of the RCMP pension and insurance plans, the report noted. In that case, the plans were charged about $1.3 million for work that provided little value and provided excessive payments to employees' family and friends.

While the auditor general found only a few instances of deliberate abuse in the three agencies, all had improperly sourced contracts, which resulted in unfairness to bidders, and there were numerous other breaches of contracting rules and in the use of government credit cards.

The auditor general found contracting shortcomings in other departments and agencies as well, including Health Canada.

But Ms. Fraser complained her investigations into government spending operations were thwarted by bureaucrats in the Treasury Board Secretariat, which controls the federal pursestrings, who denied her office access to information it needed to determine if it was properly managing overall expenditures and the spending on large costly information technology projects.

"We were unable to audit certain aspects of government operations ... because we were denied access to the information we needed," she said in the report.

Access was recently granted by cabinet order, but not before the audits were finished, the report noted.

Still, Ms. Fraser said the Conservative government has helped her auditors gain access to documents they need.

Despite the lack of earlier access, the auditor general still unearthed "weaknesses" in how the government, which spends $209 billion a year in taxpayers' money, both allocates funds to programs and ensures how those funds are spent.

For example, it found funding often didn't match up with the timeframe to deliver programs, and in one case prevented Canadian Heritage from committing funds for the last two years of a five-year cultural program.

The report also found the government was still having "serious difficulties" managing the billions of dollars a year it spends on large information technology projects.

 

EiP Comments:

 


* We have no wish to infringe the copyright of any newspaper or periodical. If you feel that we have done so then please contact us with the details and we will remove the article. The articles republished on this site are provided for the purposes of research , private study, criticism , review, and the reporting of current events' We have no wish to infringe the copyright of any newspaper , periodical or other works. If you feel that we have done so then please contact us with the details and where necessary we will remove the work concerned.


 
 
[about EiP] [membership] [information room] [library] [online shopping]
[EiP services] [contact information]
 
 
Policing Research 2010 EthicsinPolicing Limited. All rights reserved International Policing
privacy policy

site designed, maintained & hosted by
The Consultancy
Ethics in Policing, based in the UK, provide information and advice about the following:
Policing Research | Police News articles | Police Corruption | International Policing | Police Web Sites | Police Forum | Policing Ethics | Police Journals | Police Publications