Health Minister Fred Horne says AHS’s former chief financial officer won’t get severance pay.
That decision comes after the department looked at Allaudin Merali’s more than 300 thousand dollar expense bills when he worked for Capital Health as a consultant.
Horne says his department will get to the bottom of it all.
“Nothing will be allowed to be swept under the carpet,” he said. “I will keep asking questions and keep providing direction until I’m satisfied that all the information is available for everyone.”
“Because it’s only when we do that that we can make sure this never happens again.”
AHS has announced it’ll do an independent forensic audit of Merali’s expense accounts.
“The auditor is free to organize the work, because we want it to be thorough,” Horne said. “If this audit suggests that further investigation is required, that’s exactly what we’re going to do.”
Merali was making more than 400-thousand a year as CFO.
There’ll also be another review soon to be announced by Fort McMurray–Conklin MLA Don Scott; it’ll look at hiring, selection, and contracting in AHS.
Wildrose MLA Shane Saskiw isn’t satisfied.
“I don’t think the PCs should be patting themselves on the back for not giving a half-million dollar severance to someone who has only worked for Alberta Health Services for three months and has been caught with his hand in the cookie jar,” he said. “This is someone who was appointed by Premier Redford; they have to take accountability.”
Saskiw says Merali already got a million dollars in severance when Capital Health was merged into AHS in 09.
Published August 7, 2012
