An NHS trust launched a programme aimed at helping smokers quit by recruiting and training freelance therapists offering one-on-one counselling sessions with members of the specially trained team. Targets were set, exceeded and the trust congratulated itself.

Yesterday of the highest performing counsellors was sent to jail for fraud. Ha-ha you think, bet he was nipping out for a quick ciggy on his tea-breaks. It was more serious than that. The man had falsely claimed £90,000 in fees for helping imaginary people to stop smoking imaginary cigarettes.

The way in which this quit smoking scheme operated the sheer ineptitude of NHS bureaucrats. Crooked counsellor Harry Singer had spotted the flaw in the system. Or to put it in the language of Free Market economists, he saw an opportunity and took advantage of it. The management process of the Kensington and Chelsea Primary Health Trust was as tight as a clown’s trousers. Nobody was actually following up the counsellors claims to see if their claimed quitters had actually managed to stay off the smokes. Harry worked out that all he had to do was invent hoards of wannabe quitters, fill in a form and claim his fee.

Every bureaucrat knows if a piece of paper says something has been done then it must have been done. Pieces of paper do not lie.

During his trial, Singer claimed his imaginary clients were liars who said they had not joined the scheme because they did not want to admit to having started smoking again. Maybe some of them were lying about the fact that they did not actually exist too.

The former janitor told the court, “I have been a successful businessman all my life, I have driven a Porsche, owned a Rolex watch and lived in a mansion.” He also said he had only become involved in the scheme because he wanted to help the community.

Singer denied that he was a con man who was only motivated by the prospect of easy money.

He said that though his main business now was importing Mongolian Vodka (bet that came a surprise to the Mongolians) he had previously run three successful oil trading companies. His employment records revealed he had been claiming jobseekers allowance for several years.

It emerged that Kensington and Chelsea Primary Care Trust had been warned that Singer was a failed fantasist but chose to ignore the warning. Well they had a piece of paper that said he was a successful businessman and a trained Quit Smoking therapist.

And every bureaucrat knows if you have a piece of paper your arse is covered.

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