Police arrest six people in daycare rort

Grandparent welfare payments worth $15.8 million have been at the centre of a daycare rort.

According to news.com.au, police arrested six people on Wednesday for making repeated false claims on behalf of Family Day care centres they ran in Melbourne’s west.

“$15.8 million is a significant alleged welfare fraud and this is certainly the biggest one we’ve had in the last 12 months,” the AFP’s Commander Peter Crozier told reporters in Canberra on Thursday.

The majority of the claims were directly related to the Grandparent Childcare Benefit Scheme, which awards the coverage of the cost of fees for up to 50 hours of care per child per week.

“We will investigate any claims of illegal childcare services or improper behaviour, take action to shut down offenders and where necessary, bring them before the courts,” a spokesperson for the state’s Department of Education and Training said in a statement, according to the article on News.com.au.

Police have confiscated $1.1 million of assests belonging to those arrested, including two Melbourne properties, bank accounts and a pair of luxury. Police have seized these assets as proceeds of crime.

The alleged fraudsters were aged between 23 and 48 and are family members. They managed or provided direct day care services.

They have been charged with many offences including conspiracy to dishonestly cause a loss to the Commonwealth.

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17 Comments

- - mom160421 said
  - 10 Feb 2016
    2:04 pm
So glad they’ve been caught and their property confiscated. I hope most of this money is repaid.

- - serotonin said
  - 03 Feb 2016
    10:49 am
Also wondering what the pair of luxury items were! Very disappointing reading things like this. Hopefully these people have learnt their lesson now.

- - coastalkaryn said
  - 20 Jan 2016
    9:18 am
are their more scumbags in the world now, or are we just hearing more about them?
- madlac2 replied
  
  29 Jan 2016 , 12:44 pm
  definately overpopulated with scumbags.
- - june11 said
  - 02 Jan 2016
    6:29 pm
Does that mean I can claim an allowance for minding the toddler of a family member?? I would never dream of it. I don’t get paid to do it – we had a different mutual arrangement not connected to childminding.

- - mom90758 said
  - 19 Dec 2015
    2:45 pm
That’s terrible! I hope the police will get to the bottom of this.

- - mom74640 said
  - 19 Dec 2015
    11:11 am
Lke ke

- - mum888 said
  - 19 Dec 2015
    6:34 am
Another concerns were they qualified carers because they would have been putting children lives at risk . Very concerning .
- mom94125 replied
  
  19 Dec 2015 , 6:05 pm
  that is what i was thinking. are these people legit or not?
- - curlytops said
  - 19 Dec 2015
    12:07 am
what was the luxury item it half mentions?

- - mum4107 said
  - 18 Dec 2015
    10:06 pm
Oh my goodness. How disgraceful. So glad they have been caught

- - mom93821 said
  - 18 Dec 2015
    9:53 pm
In the article it reads “a pair of luxury.” A pair of luxury what? Thanks

- - BellaB said
  - 18 Dec 2015
    9:18 pm
It does not surprise me. If there’s money to be made, there’s always someone who’ll be dishonest.

- - rachelvk said
  - 18 Dec 2015
    7:17 pm
What upsets me most about this story is that these fraudsters were managing or providing child care services. It is scary to think that such dishonest people were looking after other people’s children.

- - Mummytoabeautifulprincess said
  - 18 Dec 2015
    4:39 pm
Good! Terrible that people are ripping of the system that is in place to help people in need!

- - mom165081 said
  - 18 Dec 2015
    3:28 pm
So glad they were caught!!!

- - Nas01 said
  - 18 Dec 2015
    12:41 pm
Wow, just goes to show that if your going to break the law, you will be caught.