Ms Niamh O'Donoghue:

It has been significant by giving us a whole new dimension and tool. We have concentrated much of our activity at particular airports, particularly Cork, simply to get some understanding how this process would work and how effective it can be. The powers involved allow inspectors to attend an airport if he or she has reasonable grounds to suspect somebody engaged in social welfare fraud is leaving or attending the country to perpetuate a fraud and to question such individuals.

Since this came into place in June 2012, we have had 50 detections using these powers at Dublin, Cork and Shannon airports. It has predominantly been Cork but that is because much of the initial work was done there. There are also 36 cases under investigation as well. It is a substantial piece of activity for our colleagues in the special investigation unit, SIU.