Cox: 31 suspicious rental assistance applications sent to police

As part of efforts to clamp down on fraudsters trying to take advantage of income and rental support grants Minister of Social Development and Family Services Donna Cox says 31 suspicious rental applications were sent to the police for further enquiries.

Responding to questions from Opposition Senator Damian Lyder during a Senate sitting on Tuesday, Cox said the introduction of different relief grants for people affected by the covid19 pandemic in 2020 gave rise to incidents where people have tried to defraud the government.

She said the ministry has begun a review of processes and internal controls to better detect inconsistencies in applications and reduce fraud where possible.

She said the use of fake documents to access rental assistance grants were one of the common trends seen by the ministry.

"To date, the major discrepancies identified were people who were employed and continued to be employed applying for and receiving grants, people receiving grants from both the Ministry of Social Development and the Ministry of Finance and people who were not in need of rental assistance submitting fictitious documents to support their application for the grant.

"The ministry also took steps to deal with fictitious rental applications and accordingly 31 rental applications were forwarded to the police for investigation."

She added that some of the measures in place to prevent fraud and double-dipping included online applications, a more robust validation process, data sharing with the National Insurance Board and the Finance Ministry as well as formal and informal checks with registered employers.

In July 2020 former Social Development Minister Camille Robinson-Regis reported that $284 million were spent to assist people affected by the pandemic and in November 2020 Finance Minister Colm Imbert reported that $131 million was paid to over 80,000 applicants of the salary relief grant.

In December 2020 Cox admitted that processing relief grants was one of the most difficult tasks she faced that year.