Wilce's recruiter under further scrutiny

A screengrab from the 60 Minutes programme which investigated Stephen Wilce (pictured) and the false claims on his CV.

If problems are found with Momentum Consulting's recruitment of Stephen Wilce - who is accused of embellishing his CV - then its other public sector appointments should be checked, Labour says.

Mr Wilce, chief defence force scientist for the past five years, resigned last week following an investigation by the 60 Minutes programme, which revealed he made extravagant claims about his background, including that he had a distinguished combat career.

60 Minutes said it would revist the issue tonight, saying complaints about Wilce dated back to soon after his appointment. One complaint was initially investigated, then seemingly went nowhere.

Some scientists said Wilce ignored their advice, particularly over one project which went ahead and ended up incurring a $100 million cost blow-out, the programme would say.

Wilce also claimed a popular English comedy-drama was filmed in his family home.

Several inquiries are being held.

Yesterday NZPA revealed Momentum also selected an unqualified woman, Julia Jose, to work as an accountant for the Wellington Regional Chamber of Commerce and while working there she took thousands of dollars.

Labour MP Annette King said if the Wilce inquiries found issues with Momentum's work then further checks may be needed.

"If its found that they are wanting, then there would be a case to look at many other public sector appointments if they've been used," she told NZPA.

"I think there would be a place for some spot audits of those to check out qualifications. I would have thought the most fundamental thing any recruitment company would do would be to check, check, check and that is checking qualifications and assertions people make about themselves."

Momentum did not discover Jose's lack of qualifications until concerns were raised about her performance months later. She resigned when challenged but then it was discovered more than $50,000 was missing.

She pleaded guilty to multiple charges on July 2 and will be sentenced this month.

Momentum Consulting group managing director Bede Ashby yesterday said Jose was initially hired as a contractor. He said qualification checks took a long time to complete, however all other checks including reference, criminal, credit, aliases were completed quickly.

"However as the qualifications were from an overseas university, this final check took an exceedingly long time," he said.

"During this period the client raised questions about Miss Jose's performance and we therefore completed the educational checks and discovered there were anomalies around one of her declared qualifications. Momentum advised the client immediately and action was taken by them.

"As full probity checks take some time to complete, particularly when dealing with some overseas educational institutions, Julia had already commenced in her permanent role. She had signed a Momentum application declaration which attests to all information provided by her being true and correct."

Today, Larry Small, director of Executive Appointments Ltd, who has worked in the industry for 30 years said qualification checks were a "vital responsibility".

His firm knocked back John Davy - the man who in 2002 was convicted of fraud over his false qualifications, when he applied for an executive role in 2001.

Mr Small said when dealing with overseas applicants his firm required them to get documentation from New Zealand education authorities showing they were acceptable here. Often, especially in areas like accounting, retraining was needed.

He said while recruiters wanted a successful outcome they had to pull a candidate very quickly if something did not check out "or it will come back to bite you".

Momentum declined to comment further.

- NZPA