Mr. Ron Brownasked the Secretary of State for Social Services what savings have been achieved by investigations into alleged abuses of social security benefit.
§ Mr. Prentice[pursuant to his reply, 21 July, c. 95]: On 13 February in my reply to my hon. Friend, the Member for Huntingdonshire (Mr. Major), I announced the Government's intention to increase the number of DHSS staff engaged on measures against fraud and abuse 1,050—some redeployed from other work—with the aim of saving £50 millions of social security expenditure that would otherwise have been unjustifiably incurred during the 1980–81 financial year. As I told the House in reply to questions on 25 March last, special returns were introduced to enable the results of this new policy to be evaluated.—[Vol. 978, c. 710–11; Vol. 981, c. 1155–59.]
We seem to be on target. The initial returns suggest that the additional staff will produce a net saving in social security expenditure, after allowing for salaries and other costs, of the order we expected. In addition to those identifiable savings, I believe that this campaign is having the effect of deterring people who would otherwise have tried to defraud the system, thus producing savings which are substantial although unquantifiable.
I propose to make a full statement as soon as possible after the end of the current financial year.