Over many years, we’ve warned that the enormous pot of money on offer under the $22 billion National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS) would spawn a whole range of middle-men and providers seeking to cash in, leading to significant waste, or worse fraud.
We’ve seen this before with the rorting of the private Vocational Education and Training (VET) sector, rorting of childcare subsidies, and rorting of the Pink Batts Scheme.
Two months ago, The Guardian reported that “allegations of fraud within the national disability insurance scheme have surged dramatically” with 25 dodgy former childcare operators to be booted from the scheme:
New data showed a “marked increase” in reports of potential fraud, with authorities receiving 2,293 tipoffs in the eight months to February, a 48% increase on the 1,553 recorded in the entire 2017-18 financial year…
It comes after a 2016 audit identified a lack of checks and balances within the $20bn scheme, while media reports had uncovered dozens of NDIS providers had chequered histories as family daycare operators.
Today, we’ve gotten another taste of this rorting:
The texts were among many read aloud by Justice Peter Garling, who presided over Ms Hilmi’s bail application…
She and Mr Rifai sit behind bars on charges of defrauding the National Disability Insurance Agency while their now 10-month-old son is cared for by his grandmother.
It’s alleged the Sydney couple were part of a syndicate that variously sat at the helm of three registered National Disability Insurance Scheme providers, which offered services such as nursing, cleaning, transport and home fit-outs to people supported by government-subsidised disability plans.
Police allege the south-west Sydney group of six fleeced the public by almost $3 million by lodging over-inflated invoices, falsely drawing from an individual’s disability plan so that the person was unable to make further claims.
History never repeats, but it sure does rhyme.
