§ 14. Mrs. Knightasked the Secretary of State for Social Services what estimate he has made of the total sum of money lost in supplementary benefits through fraud and mistakes in 1977; and what steps he will take to cut down this sum.
§ Mr. OrmeCash losses due to irrecoverable overpayments of supplementary benefit recorded during the financial year ended 31st March 1977 amounted to about £8 million. Although this sum is small in comparison with the total of £1.8 billion supplementary benefit paid in that year, we take our prevention responsibilities very seriously. The methods 1213 used in taking and processing claims are designed to minimise the risk of fraud and erroneous payments, and these methods will continue to be reviewed in the light of experience.
§ Mrs. KnightIn answering my supplementary question, will the right hon. Gentleman bear in mind that I am not asking how much money which could have been claimed was not claimed? Can he please confirm that the biggest rise in the amount lost comes from official errors, which represent about 40 per cent.? Will he perhaps consider the possibility that the impossible complexity of the benefit system is contributing to these errors?
§ Mr. OrmeI might tell the hon. Lady as a background to my answer that we make 100 million Giro payments a year of short-term benefits and 900 million order book payments of long-term benefits a year. That is the size of the operation. I recognise that the staff errors which were made amounted to a little more than £3 million. We spend a great deal of time and money on training, monitoring standards of work and other forms of checking, and this has to be weighed against the results achieved. Obviously we want to continue to improve them, and we examine them continuously.
§ Mr. StoddartDoes not my right hon. Friend agree that it is odd that Questions from the Opposition about fraud are always about social security recipients? Would not it be better if they concentrated some of their Questions on the enormous amount of money lost to the Exchequer through tax frauds?
§ Mr. OrmeSome Opposition Members make these accusations continuously, and they are wrong. I agree entirely with what my hon. Friend said about tax frauds.