Social Security Fraud (Hansard, 5 March 2001)

§ 34. Mr. Wilkinson
To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security how many prosecutions for social security fraud were secured in each calendar year since 1996. [150518]

§ Mr. Rooker
These figures are collected by financial year and are not available by calendar year. The number of prosecutions by financial year were given in my written answer to the hon. Member for Havant (Mr. Willetts) on 10 January 2001,Official Report, column 575–76W.

§ Mr. Efford
To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security what steps he is taking to combat social security fraud. [150499]

§ Mr. Rooker
The Fraud Bill currently before Parliament sets out measures that will make it easier to detect fraud and provide greater deterrents for those thinking of committing fraud.
Yesterday we launched a national advertising campaign that will raise public awareness and reinforce the message that benefit fraud is wrong, unfair and hurts everyone who has to pay for it.

§ Mr. Ben Chapman
To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security if he will make a statement on his proposals for reducing fraud in social security.[150492]
69W

§ Mr. Rooker
We have already taken steps to tighten the gateways to benefit, improve the training of fraud investigators, modernise technology to identify cheats, and we are seeking new powers to toughen the penalties against persistent offenders and gather the information necessary to catch them.
Today we have also launched a national advertising campaign that will raise public awareness and reinforce our message that benefit fraud is wrong, unfair and will not be tolerated.