G4S, Serco mercenaries cheated British taxpayers

This video is called G4S Privatisation of the Police.

By Paddy McGuffin in Britain:

G4S & Serco billed us for dead offenders’ ankle tags

Thursday 11 July 2013

G4S and Serco have overcharged the government by “tens of millions of pounds” for monitoring offenders’ electronic tags, Justice Secretary Chris Grayling said today.

Mr Grayling told Parliament that an initial probe showed that the firms had charged in cases when individuals were back in prison, had their tags removed, left the country or who were never tagged in the first place.

They had even charged in cases where the tagged person had died.

Probation workers said that the two firms were “unfit” to hold important public contracts while civil servants’ union PCS said it was a scandal that the government wants to hand more public services to “these vultures.”

The audit revealed that the overcharging began at least as far back as the start of the current electronic monitoring contracts in 2005 – but could have dated as far back as the start of the previous contracts in 1999.

Ministry of Justice contract managers discovered the overcharging during a routine inspection in 2008 – but did nothing to tackle the problem.

“The billing practices in question were clearly unacceptable and the government will take all necessary steps to secure a refund for the taxpayer,” Mr Grayling said.

The current contracts were awarded by the previous Labour government in November 2004 and will end soon.

Serco has pulled out of the bidding for the next contracts but shameless bungler G4S is carrying on business as usual.

Mr Grayling has told the two firms that an independent forensic audit must now be conducted.

Serco has apparently agreed but G4S has said no.

Mr Grayling’s announcement came after new figures showed that the government spent more than £394 million on contracts with G4S last year.

The Justice Secretary added that, while he had no evidence that dishonesty has taken place on the part of either company, he had asked the Serious Fraud Office to investigate G4S.

Probation union Napo general secretary Ian Lawrence said: “We’ve long maintained that these companies are unfit for purpose when it comes to holding important public contracts.

“The outcome of the initial investigation into G4S and Serco suggests a good deal of malpractice has been discovered.

“We’re especially alarmed that G4S have refused a call for further analysis.”

PCS general secretary Mark Serwotka said: “It beggars belief how many times these private companies are allowed to fail and rip off taxpayers and still be awarded government contracts.

“It ought to be a national scandal but instead this Tory-led government actually wants to sell off even more of our public services to these vultures.”

When even Justice Secretary Chris Grayling feels embarrassed enough to pull the plug on a privatisation too far, it’s an indication of the toxicity of the Serco brand: here.

Related articles

• Ministers launch G4S fraud probe (bbc.co.uk)
• Fraud squad to investigate claims G4S overcharged millions on government tagging contracts (metro.co.uk)
• Fraud Office called in after government overpays tagging firms by millions (yorkshirepost.co.uk)
• Now G4S faces £1bn fraud investigation – The Independent (independent.co.uk)
• Security firm G4S ‘kept on billing the Government after tagged offenders died’ (standard.co.uk)
• G4S Fraud Probe Into Tagging Charges (news.sky.com)
• G4S investigated for overcharging millions on government contracts (guardian.co.uk)
• Serious Fraud Office called in over G4S electronic tagging errors (itpro.co.uk)
• VIDEO: House of Lords (bbc.co.uk)
• Prison privatisations cancelled because of Serco fraud investigation (theguardian.com)