A MONMOUTHSHIRE man who was part of a multi-million pound fraud against the NHS has been jailed for a year.

Terry Dixon, 46, of New Dixton Road, Monmouth; who was found guilty of one count of conspiracy to commit fraud by abuse of position.

Along with three others, he was jailed at Leeds Crown Court yesterday (FRI).

Between 2007 to 2014, NHS employee Neil Wood - who was responsible for providing training contracts for NHS workers - outsourced work to The Learning Grove, a company owned by his friend Huw Grove. A percentage of the money paid to Grove for his services was then transferred back to Neil Wood via a company registered in his wife Lisa Woods’ name. Neil Wood also submitted over-inflated expense claims, in total defrauding the Leeds and York Partnership Trust and NHS England of in the region of £3.5 million pounds.

Neil Wood, 41, of Heydon Close, Meanwood, Leeds; who pleaded guilty to two counts of conspiracy to commit fraud by abuse of position, one count of conspiracy to commit fraud by false representation. He was sentenced to four years and eight months imprisonment.

Lisa Wood, 40, of Heydon Close, Meanwood, Leeds; who pleaded guilty to one count of money laundering. She was sentenced to 18 months imprisonment suspended for two years and 150 hours of community service.

Huw Grove, 43, of Field Farm Close, Bristol; who was found guilty of two counts of conspiracy to commit fraud by abuse of position. He was sentenced to four years imprisonment.

Terry Dixon, 46, of New Dixton Road, Monmouth; who was found guilty of one count of conspiracy to commit fraud by abuse of position. He was sentenced to 12 months imprisonment.

The Woods' accountant Simon Rothwell, 51, of Hall Close, Bramhope, Leeds, was sentenced at an earlier hearing in October and ordered to pay a £5,000 fine after being found guilty of failing to disclose a money laundering offence.

Detectives from the North East Regional Asset Recovery Team began an investigation in March 2014 after a referral was made to them by Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs. It was found that over a seven year period – in payments authorised by Neil Wood – £3.5million of NHS money was paid to The Learning Grove.

While working at Leeds and York NHS Trust, Neil Wood commissioned Grove’s company to make 24 short training films which cost the trust in excess of a million pounds. It was found that these cost just around £100,000 to produce. Lisa Wood – initially under the company name Bodynatal and then LW Learning Ltd - is said to have acted as project manager for these films and was paid a percentage by Grove; however others involved in the films have claimed she had no involvement in the production of the films.

During the seven year period, a total of £1.8million was transferred from The Learning Grove to LW Learning Ltd, a company registered in Lisa Wood’s name.

Police were able to uncover correspondence by email and text between Neil Wood and Grove in which they discuss transfer of money between accounts and what they could charge the NHS for, including corporate football tickets and trips away to London and Cardiff where they dined out at Gordon Ramsey’s Maze restaurant. One of the emails ended with: “for both our sakes let’s make sure there is no paper trail for any of this stuff. Delete, delete, delete.”

Ramona Senior, Head of the Regional Asset Recovery Team, said: “The emails between Neil Wood and Grove are very telling of their attitude to their offending, with Wood saying of a suggestion of charging £4,000 for football season tickets, ‘what’s £4,000 out of the PCT’s (Primary Health Care Trust’s) £1 billion.’ They appear to have had no qualms in making extortionate profits from the NHS, essentially taking from the public purse, and abusing the relationship between commissioner and supplier. All at a time when the pressures on public services budgets are greater than ever.

“Lisa Wood and Dixon have been complicit in this fraud and have both also benefitted financially from these crimes."