It seems that it needed the Troika and two loan agreements with strict conditions to force Greece to finally proceed to a thorough control of the exploitation of social welfare benefits and allowances. In the recent census by the Health ministry that concluded last Friday, 37,000 beneficiaries did not participated in the state control. According to the ministry, these 37,000 people have been have been receiving the social benefits illegally. An a press conference, Health minister Andreas Loverdos said that these either didn’t not participate in the census or they didn’t have the proper documents to verify their disabilities.
While the number of those receiving benefits was 240, 292 people in 2011, only 203,998 beneficiaries participated in the census. The amount of fake beneficiaries cost the Greek state 111 million euro.
It is quite “odd” that the “benefits party” has had also … geographical criteria. In Iraklio, Crete, the benefits of ‘heavy disability’ (700 euro per month) was received by 1873 people in 2009, their number increased to 2,168 people in 2011 but only 1,972 participated in the census.
In Thessalonki, the ‘motion benefit’ was received by 972 people in 2009, their number increased to 1,104 people in 2011, but only 848 participated in the census.
In 2011, the island of Zakynthos was discovered to have an epidemic of …blindness as 689 people were receiving ‘blindness’ benefits. After the uncovering of the scandal in 2011, only one hundred of the beneficiaries appeared before the health committees that found out that 60 of them were anything by blind. meanwhile, a miracle seems to have happened, as just 150 people participated in the census.
According to Sunday edition of Ethnos newspaper, there is a series of ‘epidemic’ spread of benefits in several areas across the country. “Blind” are mostly on Zakynthos, Iraklio, Florina, Kavala and Chios. Greeks suffering from “heavy disabilities” are to find in Komotini, Chalkida and Thessaloniki. Serres has a record in kidney suffering. While Thiva hit a record in all benefits for all disabilities.
In Kefalonia, almost half of the beneficiaries have suffered some kind of amputation. In Chios almost half of the beneficiaries are blind.
The health ministry considers to take legal measures against the fake beneficiaries. If the ministry demands back the ‘fake’ benefits, this would be even better 🙂
Real beneficiaries will have to appear before health committees to have verified their disability percentage. The health minister expects that after this second stage of control, the ministry will be able to save even a bigger amount of money.
Another puzzle that the ministry has to solve is , of course, the possible involvement of public officials in these frauds.
What a pity these investigations were not carried out BEFORE reducing benefits and facilities for those in real need. I trust that not only will these be reinstated but back paid too.
These are the real victims of such crimes and shame on those in government who allowed them to be penalized for no other reason than their incompetence.
so it is!
In someways its unbelievable to hear this when I know other people who had someone with real disablities and had to fight so hard to get any benefits.They also had to pass a board of people etc to show their disablity was true.So its not just the people who falsely claimed, its the people who are paid by the goverment to check which claims are real or not and have been for years not letting the people who have real diaablities claim what is rightfully theirs.Telling people who had strokes and could barely walk they were only 40% disabled and letting these you know what above get away with their false claims.Either your blind or your not …..They whole lot of them should be arrested and put away shame on them.
Of course, Eimear, it’s not just up to the fraudsters to illegally take the benefits. Doctors, administrative personnel and I don’t know how many mor epeople are involved. I know also people with real disabilities who wait for an appointment with the health committes for almost 6 months. It’s a shame for the state, to come behind this scandal only now.
So true but at least something is being done about it.Maybe they can get rid of all the fraudsters and start clearing some room for the people with the real disablities.The only shame is now these people with the real disablities have to be retested to see if they are entitled do it.
real disabled had to be retested every 5 years abyway. But now, the retest will have to be done in shorter intervals. furthermore, the ministry initiated a new system of health committees that preactically it doesn’t work. People have been waiting for more than 6 months to be (re)tested.
Good to see that under the pressure of the troika, some positive changes take place. However, as Eimear and ktg rightly point out, to focus only on the con artists defrauding the social welfare program is to do only half the job. Their enablers, who profitted from looking the other way, have to be held accountable, too! As long as the government doesn’t start a wideranging intitiative to root out corruption in the public sector, this administration simply can’t be trusted with other people’s money.
And while I understand the people who demand that the Troika shall stop the onesided austerity course and put more liquidity into the economy, to fuel a recovery, I have to ask: Do you seriously think it would be fair to put the hard earned bucks of taxpayers from other European nations into a system where every second Euro vanishes in the pockets of criminal officials? Greece desperately needs a stimulus program, but the only reasonable way to do it is through an EU project that directly funds strategic investments that will really create jobs. To hand out more money to an administration full of crooks would be madness.