Éamon Ó Cuív (Galway West, Fianna Fail)

The prevention of fraud and abuse of the social welfare system is an integral part of the day to day work of the Department. A key objective of the Department's control strategy is to ensure that the right person is paid the right amount of money at the right time. A four-pronged control strategy has been adopted by the Department, namely, prevention of fraud and error at the initial claim stage; early detection through effective review of claims in payment; measures to deter fraud; and the pursuit and recovery of overpayments. The rapidly changing economic environment, with large increases in the number of people unemployed, poses challenges for the prevention and effective management of fraud and control. The Department's response to these challenges has been to introduce new, evidence-based measures to target control activity at high-risk categories of claimants.

Control savings are an estimate of the value of the various control activities across the schemes in payment, and represent an estimate of the value of prevented expenditure on fraudulent claims. Actual recoveries arise where the Department raises overpayments in individual cases. A target of €533 million was set for control savings in 2010. At the end of September this year, some €323 million in estimated control savings had been recorded. However, work-to-rule measures in the Department earlier this year affected the reporting of the value of control activities.

Control activity is being focused on the prevention of fraud and error at claim application stage, as this is the most cost-effective mechanism of reducing losses in social welfare schemes. This is what I call a gate-keeper effect. However, savings made at application stage cannot be estimated as the claim does not go into payment.

In my view welfare fraud is theft. It is a serious crime and the Department is doing everything it can to target the people who abuse the system. The consequences for social welfare fraud can be severe. Criminal prosecutions may be taken against persons who defraud the social welfare payment system and employers who fail to carry out their statutory obligations. Fraud detection measures have increased and improved significantly over the last number of years and will continue to be reviewed to prioritise resources in order to achieve results.

The Department is committed to ensuring that social welfare payments are available to those who are entitled to them. In this regard, the control programme of the Department is carefully monitored and the various measures are refined to ensure they remain effective.

See this speech in context