Staff who are authorised to use those powers will be required to analyse and record their grounds for suspicion. They will have to consider in each case whether the circumstances suggest that there is an innocent explanation as opposed to fraud. Staff might have objective statistical evidence that shows that the individual is disproportionately likely to be fraudulent. People who commit benefit fraud tend to do it again and are therefore more likely to be fraudulent.
We are running campaigns to encourage the take-up of certain benefits. We have plans for a Bill on pension credit that will presumably be coming before the Assembly in the next session. It will deal with the problem of low take-up of benefits by pensioners. A. All cases where the benefit fraudulently obtained exceeds £1500 are prosecuted. In other cases the decision on whether or not to offer an administrative penalty is taken by a relatively small number of people using the same guidelines which should ensure consistency. Without action, the government is storing up problems for itself as disabled people will either go to Appeal or down the road put further pressure on the NHS and Social Care provisions.
The Committee must do a great deal of work to ensure the Bill does not impinge on people’s human rights and privacy. The presentation was recorded separately in verbatim minutes of evidence. The Chairman thanked the Officials and they left the meeting at 4.40pm. A. Approximately there were referrals last year of which were investigated. There were 6000 successful interviews leading to changes in circumstances, 600 prosecutions and 49 offers of administrative penalty.
At its meeting on 6 September 2001, the Committee held its first reading of the Bill and conducted an initial clause-by-clause analysis of the Bill. Again, senior officials from the Department were in attendance to offer answers to questions on technical aspects of the draft legislation. The Committee has a scrutiny, policy development and consultation role with respect to the Department for Social Development and has a role in the initiation of legislation.
Being a parent of an adult with disabilities who lives at home is a full time job. I should get my pension next year but now won’t get that til I’m 67 but am still expected to look after my adult disabled son for free. The thing is the government know that parents won’t abandon their children, however old they are. During this pandemic my son has been at home with myself and my husband. His well-being https://www.wikipedia.org/ has definitely been adversely affected by that despite our best endeavours to keep him busy and motivated despite having our own business to run alongside. We have bought various things to help with this but have been refused financial help with any of it from Norfolk CC despite him having a personal budget (Care Act – well-being) in fact they have taken money from that account without telling me.
The poultry amount that I receive from carers allowance of £67 a week in no way reflects the amount of time that I care for my lads. I receive the same amount of carers allowance as someone who is caring for 1, I never thought I would be a buy one get one free offer, I do double the work. We family carers save this country billions of pounds, but why are we treated this way.
Such evidence would constitute grounds for further investigation. That may not result in a case being taken to court, but the Department would have to investigate that matter because, as custodians of public money, we cannot allow fraud to continue without investigating it. However, in some cases we need further evidence in order to prove that a fraud is being committed. For example, someone who is in receipt of benefit may say that they are unemployed, but they may have been seen on a building site, as a result of which we suspect that they are working.
Our third area of focus is on sickness and disability related benefits. The information will only be accessed by certain staff in the Social Security Agency’s benefit investigation service. It will not be accessed by the investigator who is conducting the case, but by another person who is authorised and trained, https://www.thehormonauts.com/ and who will operate under the code of practice that we have given you. There will not be dozens of people running around the Social Security Agency, looking into bank accounts. A limited number of people would investigate those cases where it is necessary to find out more about a suspected fraud.
We have identified roughly 228 cases of suspected fraud that were recently investigated, but did not result in a prosecution, because we did not have the evidence to prove that the claimants’ circumstances had changed. It is impossible to apply a monetary figure, because we do not know how long the fraud had been going on in each case, or the amount of benefit involved. It could have been a small amount, over a long time, or a large amount over a short time. Prosecution of employers who have colluded in benefit fraud can be lengthy and costly, and that is not always the most effective way to tackle the problem. That will strengthen the ability of the Department and the Housing Executive to bring to book employers who collude with employees in social security fraud. We could offer an administrative penalty of £1000 to £2000 to a colluding employer as an alternative to prosecution.
The Department already operates a policy on sanctions for benefit claimants. The Bill extends the application of administrative penalties to employers. Guidance will be issued to ensure consistency of approach among staff involved in deciding when to prosecute or apply penalties.