Union officials are slamming a new employee tip line set up by Southwestern Ontario’s largest school board as a “snitch” line targeted at teachers who play hooky by calling in sick.

The Thames Valley District school board, victimized by two high-profile frauds in recent years that cost nearly $2 million, launched a fraud-prevention program, known as Frank, just before Christmas.

Posters began appearing in school staff rooms, urging employees to report suspected fraud on a confidential 1-800 hotline line or by email.

The whistleblower campaign comes after the two unrelated, headline-grabbing fraud cases — one last year, another in 2011 — that ended in convictions and prison time for two senior board employees.

The local head of the elementary teachers’ union says he has no problem in rooting out financial fraud. But Craig Smith said the program is not only aimed at thieving, forgery and phony expenses, but also includes “invalid claims for paid leaves of absence days,” such as sick days and absences for family care.

“The concern comes in when a policy enables people to rat out or snitch,” Smith, the local president of the Elementary Teachers Federation of Ontario (ETFO), said Friday.

The move, he said, “demonstrates a disregard the board has for the professionalism of teachers.”

Smith also questioned whether the FRANK line could be considered anonymous and confidential, as promised on the promotional poster, because teachers filing an “adverse report” about another teacher are legally required to tell the target of their complaint in writing under a provincial law.

ETFO has launched a grievance to remove paid leave days from the offences included in the board’s financial fraud campaign.

The head of the union local representing high school teachers in the Thames Valley board has similar concerns, including about the legal problem of teachers remaining anonymous when they pass on information.

Lisa MacMaster said the board hasn’t raised phony sick days taken by teachers as a significant problem,

“They have never brought that to our attention,” said MacMaster, District 11 local president of the Ontario Secondary School Teachers’ Federation.

After the two major fraud casesthe public school board needed to take action, Jeff Pratt, Thames Valley’s associate director, said.

“We’ve dealt with two significant frauds over the last few years. We decided to implement this fraud hotline as another layer of defense,” said Pratt, who noted the fraud-prevention policy had two months

of public input before it was launched.

The program covers a wide range of offences, including invalid claims for paid leaves of absence, he said.

“The boards spends millions of dollars to cover absences and it’s a concern to us if employees are fraudulently justifying time away from work,” said Pratt.

Pratt said teachers aren’t compelled to use the FRANK line and the issue of confidentialty will be resolved as the ETFO grievance proceeds.

“At the end of the day, we will respect any decisions that are made.”

Smith and McMaster both say they’re not aware of any instances, so far, where a teachers has “snitched” about a colleague’s sick days.

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BOARD’S ANTI-FRAUD LINES

Phone:1-866-921-6714

Email:tvdsb@integritycounts.ca

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HIGH-PROFILE FRAUD CASES

— Last May, David Ferguson a former Thames Valley telecommunications expert, was sent to prison for two years on fraud and breach of trust charges. Ferguson set up an elaborate scheme and netted at least $1 million by selling telephone headsets unknowingly bought by the board at bargain-basement prices.

— In 2011 Wes McConnell, who fleeced Southwestern Ontario high school sports programs out of almost $800,000, as co-ordinator of the Thames Valley Region Athletic Association, was sentenced to three years in prison. He siphoned off the money over 10 years from taxpayer-funded bank accounts he controlled. In court, it was revealed he spent the money on an elaborate backyard pool and landscaping and at his Westmount home in London, and on a compulsive gambling addiction — spending up to $400 a day on lottery tickets.

hdaniszewski@postmedia.com

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