UPDATED: Benefit fraud investigations save government €10.5m
The Department of Social Security over the past year saved €10.5 million after it investigated 3,800 cases in connection with suspected benefit fraud, Social Policy Minister John Dalli said this morning.
Speaking at a press conference to present his ministry's annual report, Mr Dalli said the ministry was setting up an inspectorate to centralise investigations relating to social benefits.
The ministry was also creating a Means Testing Unit manned by 'capable and competent people' for proper analysis of people's assets whenever this was required. The certification by this unit would be used by all departments which used means testing, Mr Dalli said.
The minister, in a hard-hitting speech, said the mentality that public funds were there for the taking needed to be eradicated, because that would threaten the country's stability.
On rent reform, he said schemes were needed to promote growth of the rental market. At the same time, it was unfair that people who were granted residences as social housing continued to use those tenements even when their financial situation improved. This was abuse of the people's public funds.The government could not continue to build properties for those in need and there had to be a stock which could be used by different families over time. This was abuse of the people's public funds. Furthermore, government properties which were sold should not be transferred at 'laughable' prices because that too was an abuse.
In his speech Mr Dalli said there was a need to restructure social benefits to address them for those really in need. What was good 50 years ago might not necessarily be good today, while there were new needs, he said.
He underscored the importance to focus on the needs of families but said that did not exclude the need to support other forms of relationships.
MATER DEI HOSPITAL
The minister acknowledged bed space problems at Mater Dei Hospital and said the country could not continue to experience such problems. A projection had been made of what was needed in the coming decade and it was important to focus on specialised geriatric care.
He said 1,000 people were using the Outpatients Department every day and the government was tackling the issue, seeking the big picture including primary health care.
He also stressed the need to reform the government pharmaceutical service including the way purchases were made and the updating of the free medicines service.
He hoped that by the end of the year there would be a programme for waiting lists so that people could be given a specific maximum waiting time for surgery.
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G. Mangion
Mar 27th 2009, 18:51
@ nigel Lawrence Good, keep on hunting down these thieves ) Your Qoute : Is it not being thief, as you put it ? Regarding, Some workers, go to work Only the Week / Monthly wage only ? The avioding .of the VAT Receiptes from, Doctor's, Lawyer's ecc, ecc. Minister Dalli, is right fighting fraud, Agree but he has to Ivestigate not only the benefit fraud Only, but the supposed worker's in all Malta too ! ... I assure you that Mr Dalli will save the Goverrment, 10 times More of the, 10.5 million euro .
john pace
Mar 26th 2009, 09:59
so give this 10.5m to maltese familys so we can pay the extra bills that we recive evrey day that money was lost so know help the ecinomy whit it
Miriam Webster
Mar 26th 2009, 09:35
@RGB/JG
Your suggestion that MA should bring such abuses to the attention of the authorities, side-steps the real issue - it is management's job to manage.
While I am not suggesting micro-management, supervisors should know what work is assigned to direct reports, and whether it is being executed to plan. In management theory, this responsibility works its way all the way up the management chain so that ultimately the person responsible is at the top of the pyramid. In the private sector, that would be the CEO/President/Managing Director/etc. In the public sector, it is the Minister.
Direction to weed-out abuses must come from the top-down, not the other way around. Any employee found abusing the system should be subject to an escalating disciplinary process which includes dismissal. And it should also apply to supervisors who knowingly allow abuses too.
Knowing that my position is at risk for allowing errant employees to run amok helps me to understand my responsibility and I have often said to them, "If this behaviour continues, one of us will have to leave (this place of employment), and I can assure you, it won't be me." Simple, but effective.
Charles Sammut
Mar 25th 2009, 17:56
As long as hard work and entrapreneurship continue to be penalised with heavy taxes while irresponsibile behaviour gets rewarded (msieken), these abuses will continue.
But Minister Dalli is doing his level best to sort out the dog's breakfast he found on his plate when he assumed responsibility for his ministry. Pity that people of his calibre populate the political scene very sparsely in this country.
r Pace Bonello
Mar 25th 2009, 15:46
Mr Aquilina apparently has reliable information regarding these government employees. Why, then, will he not share this with the authorities for them to investigate and save us all some money?
John Grima
Mar 25th 2009, 14:42
Messrs Mario Mallia, Ronnie Gauci, and Censu Attard.
If you are aware of people abusing the system as you seem to say in your contributions, have you considered doing your civic duty and reporting the persons concerned to the relevant authorities.
STEVE ELLIOTT,UK
Mar 25th 2009, 13:58
Dear Dione, only dolphins, whales and prisoners wear tags not law abiding citizens. Simply have a FREEPHONE number ,confidentiality, just like the MEPA have to "RAT on a RAT"
mario aquilina
Mar 25th 2009, 12:35
And how about checking the people that are employed by the government, and paid with taxpayers money, who sign up for work in the morning and not seen for the rest of the day as they have another cash job, somewhere else. Two jobs, two wages. How clever.
What annoy me most, is not that they are thieving, but the fact that they brag about it.
g. scerri
Mar 25th 2009, 12:31
All that Mr. Dalli said is good news and long awaited. However Mr. Dalli must find ways of restraining his party from the usual political benefits auction we have every 5 years. Also with thousands reported to be enjoying benefit disability, I would have thought that this is the time to remedy this particular abuse, when a former Minister of Finance is now in charge of Social Policy.
Ronnie Gauci
Mar 25th 2009, 12:21
Where I live (The Three Cities) the system is still being abused a lot. It's become a business, for example Mr. X is renting an apartment and living in it but this apartment is being rented on Mr. Y's name (who still lives with his parents) so Mr. Y receives a relief cheque at the end of each month (approx €400) which he shares with Mr. X for letting him apply for social benefits on his residence. Thanks to all this Mr.X will have his monthly rent paid up for him and leave him with some extra cash for the wine, mobile bill and cigarettes.
censu attard
Mar 25th 2009, 12:15
and what about those couples who are not married and never were and living together and having children and the mother takes Social Security benefit by claiming that she doesn`t know who the father is and at the same time she is living with him under the same roof. About the other Social Security benefits,there are many who are still taking benefits and at the same time work either as carpenters,fishermen, plasterers and there are even whole families taking it and there is nothing wrong with them phisically and mentally,sometimes I wonder if their family pets are taking it too,and yet I know of people who are really mentally sick and are being denied to have the benefits while they even are going in and out of the mental hospital.
Nigel Lawrence
Mar 25th 2009, 12:15
Good, keep on hunting down these thieves.
Mark Bonello
Mar 25th 2009, 11:58
A very good move in the way forward. Hats off Mr. Dalli
Tony Mangion
Mar 25th 2009, 11:39
Dear Minister,
If my memory serves me right, once you described the polyclinics as clubs for those who could not sleep during the night, now you are moaning about the shortage of beds and the poeple using the Emergency Department of Mater Dei. I also remember the than Prime Minister Dr. Fenech Adami saying 'Ghaxar miljuni l-hawn u ghaxar miljuni l-hemm x'differenza se jaghmlu. Although I consider those money as public funds, nothing has been done to remedy this short coming . Now you are back with a lot of bla bla bla, just on the eve of the MEP elections.
Joanne Micallef
Mar 25th 2009, 11:25
Well Done, this is very good news for us tax payers, hopefully the authorities will keep up their good work as I'm sure that there are plenty more out there abusing the system.
Dione
Mar 25th 2009, 11:06
Every worker should have a Tag and it should be worn whenever the worker is working - thats how hundreds of people working irregularly most of them receiving govt benefits could easily be caught red-handed - it would be then easier to do a round the islands especially construction sites on the spot checks if need be every week in different places.
victor borg
Mar 25th 2009, 10:40
WELL DONE MR DALLI
Robert Caruana
Mar 25th 2009, 10:24
Welcome news indeed. One expects that all areas of abuses are investigated throughly. May I suggest investigating, apart from the Social Security abuses: the non-issue of VAT receipts, stealing of W&E, and why not the way stipends are used.
The law abiding, tax-paying people are fed up of sponsoring such abuses.
Alfred Mallia
Mar 25th 2009, 10:14
Well done, I'm sure much more can be saved.
Loreto Debrincat
Mar 25th 2009, 10:07
And that's probably the tip of the iceberg. I would have expected that amount to be saved following investigations of Gozo social security benefactors only. Go for it minister Dalli.
j.schembri
Mar 25th 2009, 10:03
WELL DONE!!!!.......:)
duncan Tanti
Mar 25th 2009, 09:57
better than nothing.but still a long way to go.