Kieran O'Donnell (Limerick City, Fine Gael)
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Why have extra people not been assigned to the area? The topic arises every time departmental representatives come before the Committee of Public Accounts. I have not been a member of the Committee of Public Accounts for very long but it has come up every time. I imagine the transcript of the debate from last year is similar. This is not personal because our job in the PAC is to get value for the taxpayer. Less than 0.5% of spending is being captured as abuse of the system. It is important to distinguish between genuine inadvertent overpayments and fraud. The Comptroller and Auditor General made reference to distinguishing these cases. There are genuine cases but, with the large increase in social welfare payments and the additional 1,000 community welfare officers arriving in October 2011, the opportunity existed to increase the complement of 90 and to set up a targeted area of fraud. The public looks at this point. We are conscious of it every day of the week.