Mary Upton (Dublin South Central, Labour)
Link to this: Individually | In context

Question 768: To ask the Minister for Social and Family Affairs the estimate by her Department of the level of fraud in each of the areas of payment in percentage and in actual amounts for each year from 2001 to 2009; if she disagrees with figures presented in a recent television programme (details supplied), will she provide the information to refute the assertion in the programme; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [1526/10]

Mary Hanafin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)
Link to this: Individually | In context

In order to identify fraud and error levels in schemes the Department carries out detailed fraud and error surveys on individual schemes. These surveys provide evidence based indicators for levels of fraud and error within those schemes at that particular time.

The recent Primetime programme suggested a potential fraud level of 10% in the total welfare expenditure but did not produce any evidence to support this particular figure. As reported by the Comptroller and Auditor General, the percentage of expenditure resulting from fraud identified in the detailed fraud and error surveys ranged from 0% for pensioners, to 0.1% for Illness Benefit, 0.8% for the Family Income Supplement, 1.8% for Child Benefit, 2.3% for the Disability Allowance and 6.4% for the One Parent Family Payment.

An examination of welfare fraud was undertaken last year by the Oireachtas Committee on Social and Family Affairs. The report which was agreed by the Committee, in October 2009, acknowledged that there is not sufficient data to determine an overall fraud rate. However the report stated that "An estimated approximate fraud level across all schemes was put at less than one per cent". This estimate is based on fraud and error surveys undertaken to date.

In view of the number of income maintenance schemes administered by the Department, it would not be practical to carry out rolling fraud and error surveys on all major schemes on an on-going basis and therefore an estimate of the level of fraud in each of the areas of payment for each year from 2001 to 2009 is not available.

Although the level of fraud on most schemes is very low as evidenced by surveys carried out by the Department over the past number of years, within schemes however, some categories of claimants can be a much higher risk than others and when these are identified the Department moves to address this. In addition fraud detection measures have increased and improved significantly over the last number of years and will be left under ongoing review to ensure that fraud is tackled as effectively and efficiently as possible.