NAO qualifies DSS accounts
Estimated losses from fraud and errors in Income Support and Jobseeker's Allowance amounted to £1.32bn in 1999/2000, despite improvements made by the Department of Social Security.
As a result comptoller and auditor general Sir John Bourn has qualified his audit opinion on both the Department of Social Security’s appropriation account and the consolidated resource account.
According to the National Audit Office, the department’s current fraud and error target is to reduce the percentage of benefit losses by 50% by March 2006, with an initial reduction of at least 10% by March 2002.
Comptoller and auditor general Sir John Bourn, said: ‘Despite the encouraging progress that has been made by the department against the targets they have been set to reduce losses, the scale of fraud and error in these two benefits [Income Support and Jobseeker’s Allowance] remains substantial.’
The DSS has introduced a range of initiatives to reduce fraud including tighter systems for collecting and assessing evidence of claims, appropriate application of sanctions in case of fraud, and increasing the number of people prosecuted or sanctioned for fraud.
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