The Australian Taxation Office says it has launched 19 criminal investigations into allegations the Morrison government’s jobkeeper scheme is being rorted.
A spokeswoman said 11 matters were being pursued in-house and five involving “the most serious offending” had been referred to the Serious Financial Crime Taskforce, a group led by the ATO that also includes officers from other law enforcement agencies including federal police.
“We assess all instances of fraudulent behaviour for the consideration of criminal investigations,” the spokeswoman said.
“While most businesses and employees are doing the right thing, we have identified concerning and fraudulent behaviour and claims by a small number of organisations and employees,” she said.
“We will actively pursue these claims. There are penalties for making a false claim and not complying with your obligations.”
The jobkeeper program is the centrepiece of the Morrison government’s efforts to keep the economy going through the coronavirus recession, but has been plagued by reports of rorting and money being diverted to pay for company dividends or bonuses.
On Tuesday, Guardian Australia revealed concerns over real estate agencies “double dipping” jobkeeper by claiming the subsidy and then clawing it back from agents under an employment arrangement known as “debit/credit”.
Employers say they have legal advice that the arrangement is completely above board.
However, an ATO spokeswoman warned that if it found “contrived arrangements where employers seek to claw back the wages they have paid to employees, we will consider application of our scheme provisions and there are penalties for entering into schemes.”
The jobkeeper program is worth up to $100bn, of which the ATO said it had handed out about $69bn.
But hundreds of millions of dollars in payments have been cancelled or clawed back by the ATO on suspicion of fraud.
The ATO said that after compliance checks it had “permanently stopped” $200m in jobkeeper payments and clawed back about $120m.
Future payments of $350m have also been ruled out and about $100m in claims are also under scrutiny, it said.
In addition to criminal investigations, the ATO has also levied financial penalties in 19 cases, totalling about half a million dollars.
These penalties were applied for making false or misleading statements to the ATO, either recklessly or intentionally.
“A further 24 jobkeeper matters are currently being actively considered for the application of penalties,” the ATO spokeswoman said.
