Individual Learning Account News

Paul Cadman Fraud

2010-05-16T15:50:00.000+01:00

Following our original article Paul Cadman Fraud we are adding this update as some errors were made.
Paul Cadman was convicted of fraud on 15th April 2005 at Birmingham Crown Court following a lengthy trial also involving 6 people from the west midlands area.

Cadman who's previous occupations include fairground worker and train driver was the ringleader in the perpetration of the fraud which took place between June 2000 and January 2002.

The Department for Education and Skills closed the scheme in November 2001 following fraudulent claims from companies and individuals across the country.

Cadman shown here outside court on Thursday April 14 denied any fraud took place and claimed to be a legitimate training provider but as the names of applicants included the entire England football team and Harry Potter amongst others this was not accepted by the jury who found him guilty.

Det Insp Churchill,of West Midlands Police told reprters that the system in place at the time was flawed, but said the fraud was uncovered because a member of staff became suspicious of the names being used.

Paul Cadman from birmingham was employed as a caterer at the time the fraud took place and set up the training company with friends in May of 2000. Whilst the company Paul Cadman Training services did in fact provide real training and distance learning packs for some of the genuine applicants, many were just made up names submitted to the ILA in order to obtain funding for courses that never took place.

We have removed the previous article as it contained names of others who were later found not to have been involved and were simply members of staff employed by Cadman to manage and train the legitimate trainees.

Final Post

2010-03-06T22:50:00.002Z

As we mentioned in our earlier article no further funding for this blog is being made available so there will be no further posts after today.

I would like to thank John Stokes and Melissa Millard for their hard work and dedication in preparing the articles and information we have provided over the last 18 months.

We will be back online later in 2010 with a new information service sponsored by the .DotGov network and we will publish an article on this page to give any interested people the link.

There will be the usual inside information and ideas as well as reports on the latest schemes and grants on offer.

As soon as we get the url it will be listed here.

Thanks for all the visits.

Makrk T.

Paul Cadman Birmingham Convicted

2010-02-22T16:26:00.004Z

April 15 2005

Paul Cadman from Birmingham was given a 5 year sentence for his part in a plot to deceive the governments ILA scheme.

Cadman shown here outside court yesterday was found guilty last month and the case was adjourned for sentence until today.

Paul Cadman from Washwood Heath Birmingham was accused along with 17 others of defrauding the ILA Scheme and playing a part in its closure in November 2001.

The £199m budget for the first two years of the ILA scheme was overspent by £96.3m but as yet it is unclear as to how much of this was lost to fraud and how much was lost through poor management by the schemes operators.

Six people were jailed and nine others were given a combination of community punishment orders, fines and costs. Police officers involved in the case said they expected more prosecutions to follow and any further information will be published here.

The Department for Education and Skills said they were pleased with the result and were hopeful this would set an example to others.

ILA Fraud Widespread

2009-11-13T00:19:00.001Z

Wednesday April 20 2005

Over a third of the money spent on the now closed Individual Learning Account Scheme went on fraud or payments which broke the rules of the scheme, Parliament has been told.

A statement from the National Audit Office said the mis-spent money was estimated as likely to total some £97m.

The Department for Education and Skills is still unable to estimate how much if any it will be able to recover.

The amount spent on the scheme was over £70m more than its budget.

According to the audit office report, the cost of fraud and serious irregularities, based on estimates and extrapolations by the department, may be up to £67m.

In addition, the department estimated it had made irregular payments of some £30m.

This is where good quality learning was delivered but the payments did not fully meet the rules.

An example would be where the learning provider did not seek from the learner the full contribution they were supposed to make to their training course

Prosecutions will continue.

2009-11-03T21:52:00.002Z

The latest decision is that even though the scheme is now closed the cases pending prosecution and any new cases that are uncovered as a result of new evidence will continue.

Both Government and Police sources confirmed there are now over 50 cases underway around the country and some are already charged and awaiting prosecution.

Our funding for this news blog is available until the end of the year so we will continue to report on any case results or new prosecutions as they occur.

Several new schemes to replace ILA are ow being discussed and we will bring you details of any progress or decisions made.

First ILA Fraud Case Begins

2009-10-29T04:57:00.002Z

A woman has appeared in court charged with using bogus students to defraud the Governments Individual Learning Accounts system.

Miss Sylvia Iwuagwu, 25, a Nigerian citizen living in Brentford, appeared before City of London magistrates on Tuesday of this week.

She is charged with defrauding the Department for Education and Skills of £9,600 on or before October 19 and falsely claiming to have put 48 clients through something called the "City Institute".

Full Legal aid was granted and no application for bail was made.

She will appear at Southwark Crown Court on January 16, when she will be invited to enter a plea.

Ms Iwuagwu is the only person known to have been charged with ILA fraud so far but many more cases are under investigation with further charges and prosecutions set to follow.

So far, 39 people have been arrested and seven police forces have been working in conjunction with the DFES to follow up fraud allegations

We will release more information as and when more individual cases appear before court.

ILA Fraud Causes Closure

2009-10-22T07:16:00.001+01:00

The scheme began in September 2000 and involved the government subsidising courses for adults in basic skills or subjects like computing.

Students paid a small contribution, with course providers claiming the rest of the fee from the government.

But tricksters are alleged to have claimed money for non-existent courses and to have used people's names to claim money without their knowledge.

The problem was exacerbated by Capita failing to include any "exception reports" to highlight unusual items of activity or particularly large claims from training providers, two of which exceeded £6m.

The scheme cost £273m in total - but there is no clear picture of how much of this was stolen, as it is not known how many of the 2.6m accounts opened were genuine.
At one point, 10,000 accounts were being opened daily - and the ILA budget was over-spent by £93.6m.

Hundreds of course providers are now being investigated. More than 100 files have been sent to the police and 60 people arrested.

Some of these are awaiting court appearances and one has been sentenced to nine months in prison. The DfES is also pursuing another 400 providers.

ILA Closed

2009-10-21T10:44:00.002+01:00

THE INDIVIDUAL LEARNING ACCOUNT PROGRAMME HAS NOW CLOSED

The Individual Learning Account programme launched nationally in September 2000.

In October 2001 it had 2.5m members registered with over 9,000 organisations registered as learning providers.

The Secretary of State announced the programme was being suspended from 7 December 2001 due to evidence of abuse by a small minority of providers.

After further serious allegations of potential fraud and theft involving ILAs, it was decided on 23 November 2001 to shut down the programme immediately.

This News blog features follow up articles and information in relation the the prosecution of some of those involved.