Jailed NHS fraudster will not have to pay back swindled cash

Paul Mainwaring

Paul Mainwaring (55) of Turton Road, Tottington has heard that he will not face action by the Crown Prosecution (CPS) to recover the money he swindled from the NHS whilst acting as a business consultant and Patient’s Champion.

Mainwaring was jailed for two years in April of this year after admitting falsely claiming £39,114 in benefits and withholding £68.704 in VAT. He billed health trusts including Heywood, Middleton and Rochdale PCT and Bury PCT for work he had done using a false VAT number. His swindles covered a five year period 2005 and 2011.

Health bosses became suspicious when they discovered that Bury LINk, an organisation that Mainwaring had worked for as a volunteer, had been contracting for services from a company owned by Mainwaring and an internal investigation was carried out.

Despite the fact that Mainwaring led a champagne lifestyle, that included cruise holidays, investigators working for the CPS were unable to find any hidden cash or discover any assets such as houses or cars and were therefore unable to bring a prosecution under the Proceeds of Crime Act. (POCA)

Mainwaring is a well-known figure on the local health scene and was involved in both the ’Healthy Futures’ and ‘Making it Better’ consultations where he was commissioned to carry out transport surveys between the various hospital sites.

Local health campaigner Jean Ashworth said that she felt it was ‘disgusting’ that it had not been found possible to recover any of the money and said that she had reservations about Mainwaring’s role in the local health consultations. She told Rochdale Online, “I was never comfortable with his role as a ‘Patients Champion’ whilst he was getting paid for consultancy work. It just didn’t seem right to me.” 

http://www.rochdaleonline.co.uk/news-features/2/news-headlines/69116/jail-for-patients-champion