An African NDIS provider director has been arrested in Adelaide over an alleged plot to defraud the scheme out of $5 million using protected inside information.
The 38-year-old man was stopped by police at Adelaide Airport on Friday while preparing to leave the country, and police said the arrest was linked to an investigation that resulted in a woman, 48, being charged over the same alleged plot in June.
The man was charged with dealing with the proceeds of crime and soliciting protected NDIS participant information from a National Disability Insurance Agency (NDIA) staff member, and was remanded in custody to face court on Monday.
Investigators from the Fraud Fusion Taskforce, which was set up to crack down on rampant fraud in the National Disability Insurance Scheme, began their probe in March after identifying alleged unauthorised access to protected records of NDIS participants.
A series of raids were carried out in Blakeview, Mawson Lakes, and Prospect, and the 48-year-old was charged with disclosing protected agency information, abuse of public office, attempting to forge documents to cause a loss to the Commonwealth, and dishonestly obtaining a financial advantage for another person.
Police allege she used her position as an NDIA employee to access more than 40 NDIS participant records, and then illegally provided them to the man for financial benefit, receiving more than $53,000.
The man allegedly used the information provided to make thousands of NDIS funding claims to the value of about $5 million at his registered NDIS provider business.
NDIS Quality and Safeguards Commissioner Louise Glanville said the agency’s anti-fraud crackdown was aimed at winning back public confidence in the troubled scheme.
“Providers who seek to misuse NDIS funding undermine trust in the disability support system and put the integrity of the Scheme at risk,” she said.
“We will continue to use the full range of our compliance and enforcement powers to protect people with disability from harm and safeguard the integrity of the Scheme.
“The NDIS Commission will continue to work closely with our partners to detect, investigate and take strong enforcement action against those who seek to profit from fraudulent conduct.”
The arrest comes after NDIS Minister Jenny McAllister revealed the $56billion/year NDIS was losing $4 billion annually to fraud, although investigators have previously said the amount being stolen is over $8 billion and impossible to calculate.
Ms McAllister also said that of 1,400 plan managers, 90% of the 1,000 smallest had been flagged for fraud or integrity issues.
Header image: Left, right, the man being arrested (AFP).
