A Highland Council employee has been struck off after it emerged he failed to deposit thousands of pounds from tenants living in sheltered housing.
Kevin Jamieson, from Inverness, was employed with the Highland Council as an assistant tenant services officer between 2016 and 2018.
The Scottish Social Services Council (SSSC), with whom Mr Jamieson was registered, has been conducting an investigation and has now released their damning report.
The report says Mr Jamieson, while employed by Highland Council, failed to deposit cash collected from sheltered housing tenants on 19 separate occasions between May 19, 2016, and October 31, 2018.
A total of £6,129.90 was due to be deposited into the council’s bank account but never was.
The report lists sums over the two years ranging from £85.50 at the lowest and £608 at the highest.
Kevin Jamieson failed to deposit more than £6,100
The SSSC panel concluded Mr Jamieson’s fitness was impaired.
“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 re-allocated to sheltered accommodation in the budget.”
It was also noted because Mr Jamieson repeatedly failed to deposit funds 19 times, it established a “substantial pattern” of behaviour and the risk of repetition was high.
The SSSC panel said any punishment other than removal from the register would not be appropriate given the severity of Mr Jamieson’s actions.
A Highland Council spokesperson said: “We do not comment on staff matters. The individual concerned is no longer employed by the council.
“We are unable to comment on the individual issues involved because of personal and legal matters.”
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