John Parkinson was a beloved father and grandfather, who was born in Ireland, but called Canada home for the majority of his life, ending his days at the age of 95, at a nursing home in Stratford. To honour his memory, his family has started a foundation to help seniors from being scammed out of their hard earned money, like he and his family were. “My dad was always a very generous and loving person, and anyone who knew him never had a negative word to say about him. So, in order to honor my father’s memory, we wanted to reach out to the public, and make sure that other families and individuals out there don’t have to go through the same turmoil in their time of grieving,” says Dave Parkinson, John’s son. Canadians lost nearly $1 billion to fraud last year. Dave hopes the John Parkinson Family Foundation can help lower that number through education, advocacy, and simply not shying away from the uncomfortable subject. “Many individuals don’t realize that after this has happened, it can be very difficult to find relief through legal circles. And if it ends up in civil courts, you’re looking at tens, if not hundreds of thousands of dollars, and years of litigation in order to recover lost funds. So, it’s important to put a stop to this before it actually starts,” says Parkinson. Parkinson says fraudsters are preying on seniors, like his late father, and it has to stop. “We’re seeing the financial predators up their game to a level that we’ve never seen before. We have these AI grandparent scams where you can actually clone the image of a loved one and reach out to them. We see the C.R.A scams, with people calling up. Bitcoin, everyone wants to pay in Bitcoin. So there’s many red flags that people need to look out for, especially in this day and age,” says Parkinson. The Foundation was just launched in January, but they’ve already been in touch with banks, credit unions, and the Canadian Investment Regulatory Organization, to try and advocate for improved fraud protections. “We’re seeing a major demographic shift that we haven’t seen in Western history before, and a wealth transfer to the extent that we haven’t seen before. So, it’s important to educate the public and the other stakeholders out there about the necessity to ensure that our seniors are kept safe and that financial predators are stopped in their tracks,” says Parkinson.
