A social care worker from Inverness has been struck off after failing to deposit thousands of pounds of income collected from sheltered housing locations over a period of two years.
The Scottish Social Services Council (SSSC) ruled that Kevin Jamieson, while employed by Highland Council, had “failed to uphold proper standards of conduct” before taking the decision to impose a removal order, removing him from its register.
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The watchdog’s findings revealed a total of 19 instances of Mr Jamieson failing to deposit sums collected into the council’s bank account, amounting to £6129.90 in total.
The SSSC cited failed deposits beginning on May 19, 2016, with the most recent on October 31, 2018, ranging in value from £85.50 to £608.
The SSSC found that Mr Jamieson’s fitness to practise had been “impaired” by his misconduct, and that the pattern of behaviour had been substantial.
It noted that the “amount of money that was not deposited was substantial” and that the misconduct could have had “potential financial impacts of service users.”
It said Mr Jamieson’s behaviour was “extremely serious” and decided that simply issuing a warning “would give no protection to service users or the public.”
Offering its reasoning for the decision to remove Mr Jamieson from the care register, it told him: “Social services workers, in whom the service users and the public place their trust and confidence, are expected to be truthful, open, honest and trustworthy, and adhere to employer instructions in relation to finances.
“Failing to deposit thousands of pounds into the bank which you had collected from sheltered housing locations over a period of two years is behaviour which is fundamentally incompatible with professional registration.
“The behaviour is serious and resulted in a financial loss to your employer and had a risk of financially impacting on services users as the collected money was to be reallocated to sheltered accommodation in the budget.
“The risk of repetition of the behaviours is high given that the behaviour occurred on 19 occasions over a prolonged period of time.
“While you did not work directly with service users, the SSSC considered that there is a clear risk to protect service users and the wider public from this behaviour because your actions in failing to deposit money could have had a direct financial impact upon them.
“A reasonable member of public in receipt of all the information would consider the reputation of the profession to be damaged as a result of your behaviours because you have acted in a way that fails to uphold the proper standards of conduct.”