G4S mercenary corporation defrauds British taxpayers

This video from Britain is called G4S Privatisation of the Police.

From daily The Morning Star in Britain:

G4S boss admits privateer ‘can’t tell right from wrong’

Thursday 21st October 2013

by Ryan Fletcher

Privateers admit wrongdoing after overcharging Ministry of Justice

G4S boss Ashley Almanza told MPs yesterday that the company had trouble telling right from wrong.

Being grilled by public accounts committee MPs about overcharging for tagging offenders, Mr Almanza said: “I don’t think we did correctly tell the difference between right and wrong. We got it wrong.”

And fellow privateer Serco chairman Alistair Lyons admitted that it was “ethically wrong” that his company also milked the Ministry of Justice for millions.

The Serious Fraud Office (SFO) is investigating the two firms for overcharging on the tagging contracts – claiming money for offenders who turned out to be dead, back in prison or overseas.

The pair apologised and insisted they weren’t involved in any other dodgy dealings.

But public-sector union Unison leader Dave Prentis stormed: “Saying sorry hardly compensates for a catalogue of catastrophes and for wasting millions of pounds of taxpayers’ money.

“How many more millions will be wasted by failing contractors before the government starts hearing the alarm bells and calls for a wider review of the use of outsourcing in public services?”

Committee chairwoman Margaret Hodge said the firms had only stopped because they were caught.

“If you had never been caught on some of these people who are out of jail, dead or whatever, you would have carried on charging to the year 3,000,” she said.

The government has rejected a £24 million offer from G4S to settle the overcharging scandal.

Officials vowed to “pursue all possible avenues” to recoup the cash.

Asked if anyone had been sacked, Mr Lyons said: “The Serious Fraud Office has asked us not to potentially compromise their investigation by our own at the moment.”

Mr Lyons agreed the same applied at Serco.

Both firms’ share prices have plummeted in the wake of the scandal, with Serco losing a third of its value – equal to £1.3 billion.

Plan to privatise three UK prisons cancelled amid overcharging claims at Serco, which was lead bidder: here.

Justice Secretary Chris Grayling was forced yesterday to cancel bids by notorious security privateer Serco to run three prisons: here.

Related articles

• G4S boss sorry for overcharging (standard.co.uk)
• Tagging Overcharges: G4S And Serco Apologise (news.sky.com)
• G4S and Serco apologise for overcharging fiasco (itv.com)
• G4S boss ‘sorry’ for overcharging (bbc.co.uk)
• G4S chief faces grilling by MPs (standard.co.uk)
• Scandal-hit security firm G4S to pay back over £24m after overcharging taxpayers for electronic tagging of offenders (independent.co.uk)
• New details emerge of electronic tagging scandal (telegraph.co.uk)
• G4S offer to pay back £24m of taxpayers’ money after charging for tagging offenders who were DEAD (mirror.co.uk)
• G4S’s £24m offer for overcharging on tagging rejected by MoJ (theguardian.com)
• UK boss Jeremy Stafford quits Serco after overcharging row (theguardian.com)