Disgraced Fort Mac Bureaucrat Surfaces as Manitoba Union CEO
Remember Sudhir Sandu? He’s the former Regional Municipality of Wood Buffalo (greater Fort McMurray) senior bureaucrat who resigned under a cloud of suspicion this winter with a KPMG audit pending. A tipster to the CTF informs us that he has resurfaced as the CEO of the Manitoba Building Trades and Allied Hydro Council, an umbrella union organization.
To recap, Sandhu was one of the senior bureaucrats who helped to oversee the mass firing (without cause in most cases) of municipal staff at the RMWB and the massive severance payments that followed, topping $6.6 million, revealed in a CTF Freedom of Information (FOI) request.
The CTF also released documents obtained through FOI showing that Sandhu billed taxpayers for tens of thousands in dubious expenses.
Sandhu’s expenses include:
- $89,000 in flights over 28 months, including unlimited flight passes with no reporting on where he actually flew;
- At least two expensive trips to Singapore, with no explanation of the charges, costing at least $8,285 in airfare alone;
- $322.56 for “masala, cinnamon, and ginger” scented soaps;”
- $283.37 from a toy store with an unreadable receipt;
- $281.81 for books; and
- A heavily redacted document with an unexplained hand written note about a “Vegas Conference.”
Whistler blowers have also told the CTF that expenses claimed during the last months of Sandhu’s employment – not covered by these FOI documents – requires additional examination.
I, nor our Manitoba Director, Colin Craig, have any beef with the Manitoba Building Trades and Allied Hydro Council (MBTAHC), but they might want to reconsider what they are getting into here. Hiring a bureaucrat who fled Fort McMurray in disgrace and who abused his expense account, lends itself to four questions.
- Does the MBTAHC feel that hiring Sudhir Sandhu as their CEO looks very good on them as an organization?;
- Are the workers represented by the MCTAHC comfortable paying dues to an organization headed by a man who had lots of funny business with his expense account?;
- Do the workers represented by the MCTAHC feel that a man who helped to oversee mass firings of employees without cause is ideally suited to represent them as employees?; and
- Did they even do a Google search of this guy?
I have a pretty good idea how taxpayers in Fort McMurray/Wood Buffalo would answer those questions.