Senior managers at a Scottish quango asked staff to forge and falsify documents ahead of an external audit, an Employment Tribunal has heard.
Officials at National Services Scotland (NSS), which provides services and equipment to Scotland’s health boards and is answerable to the Scottish government, allegedly told staff to “do what you have to do” to “fill the gaps” in files relating to corporate contracts.
The tribunal heard how staff were being asked to doctor records even on the day auditors from Pricewaterhouse Coopers arrived at NSS offices to begin the audit.
Former manager Debbie Selkirk told the tribunal that she had been subjected to an internal investigation after telling her staff not to carry out actions she considered illegal and inappropriate, reports the Scotsman.
Selkirk, who is claiming unfair dismissal against the NSS, said that Jim Miller, strategic sourcing director and Barry McGann, sourcing manager, told staff to “retrofit the process”. When she asked whether this meant adding signatures to documents, she was told it did.
Selkirk was suspended over allegations of data falsification, but was later cleared. She pressed ahead with a grievance claim, before again being accused of forgery, which she denied. She left the NSS in January 2009. The tribunal continues.
