Tom Hayes (Tipperary South, Fine Gael)
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Question 560: To ask the Minister for Social and Family Affairs the number of staff in her Department that are employed to investigate social welfare fraud; the number that have been employed in this capacity every year since 2000; the number of prosecutions for social welfare fraud have been made every year since 2000; and the estimated amount her Department has lost in revenue through social welfare fraud from 200 to date in 2010. [12412/10]

Mary Hanafin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)
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There are over 620 staff working in areas related to control of fraud and abuse of the welfare system. As part of its control strategy the Department carries out detailed fraud & error surveys on individual schemes which provide evidence-based indicators of the levels of fraud & error for those schemes at that particular time. The level of fraud on most schemes is very low. The percentage of expenditure resulting from fraud identified in the Department's 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.

In relation to savings in 2009, the Department recorded control savings of nearly €484m. It must be noted that control activity was being focused on prevention of fraud and error at claim application stage. Savings made from the detection of bogus claims at application stage are not included in the Departments overall savings as the claim will not go into payment. However, this is the most cost effective mechanism of reducing losses through fraud and error in social welfare schemes. The number of criminal prosecutions in relation to social welfare fraud finalised in court for years 2000 to end February 2010 is set out in the tabular statement:

Criminal Prosecutions 2009 to end February 2010:

I regret that I am unable to provide the historical information sought by the Deputy in relation to staff numbers involved in control work since 2000.