Ms Niamh O'Donoghue:

Yes. The Deputy must bear in mind that the table does not capture the fact that where the fraud is serious, the person in question is at risk of being prosecuted, although only a small proportion of cases are ultimately prosecuted. Regardless of the person's eligibility for a different social welfare payment, he or she will be at risk of being prosecuted. Their eligibility is distinct and different.

The second point is that if, through a person's efforts - whether fraud or error - an overpayment is raised against him or her, he or she is liable to have this overpayment recovered. It is not as if a person in this position starts from a clean sheet.

This is reporting on the fraud and error surveys and I suppose I should refer to it as suspected fraud. This is where the deciding officer or inspector has made a judgment on the basis of the evidence available to him or her that this is suspected fraud or a suspected error. Sometimes there can be a fine line between the two in terms of whether somebody has deliberately withheld information from us or simply forgotten to give us the information. Two judgments could be made in that respect.

On the issue of reinstatement, if a person's claim is terminated or reduced, he or she will have an opportunity to appeal. The appeals officer who rehears all of the evidence presented may make a different determination from the deciding officer, one that may lead to the case being reinstated. Whereas the deciding officer might have come to a view that there was fraud in a case, this view may not be echoed by the appeals officer. I cannot give the Deputy a value for the proportion of cases where this occurs.

One aspect of the social welfare system is that it is designed to provide income where an income need has been established. This is done based on particular contingencies or situations. Somebody may not fit a particular scheme and may be defrauding that scheme, but his or her circumstances may dictate that he or she has an entitlement in a different part of the social welfare code. This is separately legislated and provided for and we must respect this.