Social Security Fraud (Hansard, 16 June 2003)

§ Mr. Hancock

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions how many people were(a) cautioned and

Prosecutions and sanctions since 2000
	2000–01	2001–02	2002–03
	DWP	Local authority	Total	DWP	Local authority	Total	DWP	Local authority	Total
Custodial sentences²	660	¹—	¹—	650	¹—	¹—	470	¹—	¹—
Community sentences³	2,700	¹—	¹—	3,070	¹—	¹—	2,810	¹—	¹—
Other sentences⁴	8,040	¹—	¹—	7,470	¹—	¹—	5,990	¹—	¹—
Total successful prosecutions	11,400	1,110	12,510	11,180	1,700	12,880	9,270	1,691	10,961
Cautions	7,840	—	7,840	7,030	1,470	8,500	7,080	2,435	9,515
Administrative penalties	7,710	550	8,260	6,520	1,131	7,651	7,190	1,605	8,795
Total	26,950	1,660	28,610	24,730	4,301	29,031	23,540	5,731	29,271
¹ Breakdown not available

Notes:

1. Local authority figures are available for first three quarters of 2002–03 only.

2. Imprisonment, Young Offenders Institute, or custodial and fine.

3. Community Service.

4. Absolute discharge, conditional discharge, compensation only, admonishment, fine, community rehabilitation, suspended sentence, supervision order, Young Offenders Institute, attendance centre, unknown.

5. Cautions were made available to local authorities as a sanction from the start of 2001–02

6. Figures for financial year 2000–01 are taken from local authority management information returns. It is possible that there could be some double counting with DWP data if there were cases which involved a joint prosecution.

7. Management information data for financial year 2000–01 is not available for all local authorities. The total for Great Britain includes estimates for local authorities that have not responded. These estimates are based on historical and regional data. This type of estimate is standard practice in reporting totals where there have been non-respondents. The figures for financial year 2000–01 have been rounded to two significant figures.

8. Information for 2001–02 is from a count of prosecutions and sanctions completed by all local authorities; this data is collected from local authority subsidy returns. Subsidy data may differ from management information data (shown for financial year 2000–01) at local authority level; however, analysis shows a high level of consistency between the two data sources at national level.

9. The DWP figures are from the Fraud Information By Sector database, which shows completed cases commenced in the relevant period. Due to the elapsed time between commencement of an investigation and completion of a prosecution there are cases that are inserted into previously completed data for earlier periods. All DWP totals are therefore correct at the time when quoted but subject to adjustment at a later date

10. In accordance with National Statistics Guidelines all DWP figures are rounded to the nearest 10. Due to rounding process totals may not agree.