CIG fraud hotline gets 29 reports in four years

Since its creation in June 2017, the Cayman Islands Government’s fraud hotline has received a total of 29 reports.

However, based on data released by the Portfolio of the Civil Service through a Freedom of Information request filed by the Cayman Compass, none of those reports led to any investigations for fraud.

PoCS information manager Peter Gough, in his response to the request, shared that since the hotline was established in June 2017, government has received an average 7.25 reports per year for the period June 2017 to June 2021.

“Not all of the reports applied to the [Cayman Islands Government]; several related to the private sector or private citizens, and some were irrelevant (i.e. they were not related to fraud or corruption),” he explained.

The fraud hotline was formed as part of a government push to weed out corruption and flag wrongdoing within the civil service and accompanied the introduction of its Anti-Fraud policy.

That policy sought to outline procedures for dealing with fraud risk, define what constitutes fraud and set out whistleblowing processes.

The hotline itself operates similar to the Cayman Crime Stoppers tip line, where callers or emailers are assigned a case number that tipsters can use to contact the line again to keep track of their report, while remaining anonymous.

It is managed by government’s Internal Audit Services (IAS.)

IAS was not able to provide a log of calls, “as all calls are answered by our contracted agents in South Africa and India”.

The FOI response stated that the Portfolio of the Civil Service has never been provided with such a log.

“All the IAS gets is what’s called a web report and follow-up requests,” the response stated.

Outside of the fraud hotline, the Ombudsman’s Office facilitates whistleblowing and is the authority with responsibility for the Whistleblower Protection Law.

It provides a reporting form for whistleblowers and is applicable to those who wish to make reports on employers and employees in both the private and public sector.

Similar to the hotline, the Ombudsman’s Office is also receiving only a limited number of complaints.

In its 2020 annual report, the Office stated that whistleblower protection continues to be a “developing part” of its work, as it only recorded six reports during 2020 and just three in 2019.

“Those numbers remain relatively small and our investigators have reported that people who come to our office seem reluctant to make a protected disclosure when they learn that the Whistleblower Protection Law does not prevent them from being fired. The legislation instead provides a remedy only after an employer takes detrimental action against the employee,” the Ombudsman’s report stated.

In fact, it added that work permit holders may feel vulnerable to this risk because, if they are terminated, they lose their right to remain in Cayman.

“Caymanians and permanent residents may feel that they would be blacklisted after being fired for making a whistleblower complaint, perhaps becoming unable to find employment elsewhere in the Islands. We are currently reviewing the law and intend to make recommendations for amendments in 2021,” the Office stated.

Individuals can report unethical concerns in three ways: