A former commercial diver has been jailed for three years after falsely claiming more than a million dollars in GST refunds

Tony Cree was sentenced in the Christchurch District Court today.

He had earlier pleaded guilty to representative charge of dishonestly and without claim of right using a document to obtain a pecuniary advantage.

At one point he claimed his partner was sick and had died, which made it difficult for him to comply with Inland Revenue requests.