Former childcare centre director and two staff to be charged with filing false childcare subsidy claims

SINGAPORE - A former director of a chain of childcare centres and two of her employees will be charged on Wednesday (March 17) with allegedly cheating the Early Childhood Development Agency (ECDA) of almost $5,000 in childcare subsidies.

The police said in a statement on Tuesday the former director, a 53-year-old Singaporean woman, and her two female employees, aged 42 and 53, had allegedly conspired to deceive ECDA into disbursing subsidies for eight children at Faith Educare.

The children had either not yet been enrolled in the childcare centres when the subsidies were claimed or did not attend Faith Educare centres at all, the police said.

The three women are accused of submitting 16 subsidy claims to ECDA, falsely confirming the attendance of the eight children between January and August 2016.

This allegedly resulted in wrongful payouts amounting to $4,800.

ECDA administers the childcare subsidies scheme, which helps to defray pre-school expenses for Singaporean children by paying subsidies to licensed childcare centres here.

The agency said in a statement the money that was paid out has been fully recovered.

ECDA had detected irregularities in Faith Educare's subsidy claims in August 2016 and referred the matter to the police. It added that Faith Educare is no longer in operation.

It said in the statement: "For the disbursement of pre-school subsidies under ECDA, there are processes and checks in place to ensure the proper use and accountability of government monies. ECDA maintains close oversight of pre-schools' use of government subsidies which includes conducting regular audits."

ECDA added it takes a serious view of individuals or licensees that misuse government funding and will not hesitate to take action against those who breach the Early Childhood Development Centres Act and Regulations.

The police also said they take a serious view of persons involved in dishonest or fraudulent conduct pertaining to applications for government grants.

If convicted, the three women can be jailed for up to 10 years, fined or both.

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