Marie-Anne Thompson gets her day in court – maybe.
The ex-head of immigration is now going through deposition hearing to determine whether she will go to trial for allegedly lying on her CV. This is something that has been rumbling on for a while now, and it will be interesting to finally see the outcome. (If we ever get there).
So what is the deal here?
Well, in all the hullabaloo over whether Ms Thompson did or did not use her position to influence her family getting residency visas that they were not entitled to, it also emerged that she was claiming on her CV that she had a PhD when she didn’t.
She is in court on this point – this has nothing to do with the immigration of her family members. She faces 3 charges of fraud.
Mary-Anne Thompson did indeed study at the London School Of Economics – starting out on a Masters degree and at some point transferring to a Doctorate. The issue surrounds the question of whether or not she ever was ever actually awarded a degree – specifically the PhD.
Staff from the London School of Economics are giving evidence by video link.
It seems that although a thesis was submitted, it was sent back to be corrected and improved and so far it looks like that was last the LSE heard on the matter. It all gets a bit confusing with one report saying the thesis went back three times, another saying that an oral exam was suggested but never took place, one saying there are documents available showing a Masters degree was awarded. I think it needs a proper court case just to establish what the real facts are!
What does not seem to be in doubt at the moment is that there is no PhD. Ms Thompson claims that she believed she had one – and that’s the one part of this I have very little time for. How on earth do you not know that you didn’t actually get a degree? If you had spent all that time studying – wouldn’t you make absolutely sure you had the proof to back it up? Especially when working in a field like immigration where applicants have to be able to prove every last detail with documentation. There is always a paper trail somewhere!
There is actually an awful lot about this in the Auditor General Report – part 2 of which is specifically about the Issue of the PhD. I’ll go into that in a separate post – otherwise you will probably be bored to tears – but one thing did come through in that: everyone would have still given the job to Ms Thompson whether she had a PhD or not – based on the level and quality of her work. I can’t help but feel a bit sorry for her that she appears to have felt the need to lie to bolster a career that was so well respected. Especially since, in lying – she has wrecked that reputation completely.
On the other hand – I also have absolutely zero sympathy – given the treatment meted out to migrants who similarly “lie” on their applications – knowingly or by accident.
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Related posts:
- Some interesting facts and figures about Immigration New Zealand.
- The Auditor General’s Report on Immigration New Zealand is out.
- Auditor General report – The NZIS computer system sucks.
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