Fraud and Error Stocktake
The government continues to lose large amounts of money through fraud and error overpayments and many vulnerable people get less support than they are entitled to.
21 Jul 2015
The government continues to lose large amounts of money through fraud and error overpayments and many vulnerable people get less support than they are entitled to.
The Comptroller and Auditor General, Amyas Morse, has qualified his audit opinion on the regularity of the 2014-15 accounts of the DWP, owing to the unacceptably high level of fraud and error in benefit expenditure.
It is important that the DWP use the hard lessons it learned from implementing its recent programme of welfare reforms to improve how it manages change and anticipates risk.
The DWP has reset Universal Credit on a sounder basis but at significant cost, by extending the time for implementation and choosing a more expensive approach.
This Departmental Overview is one of 17 we are producing covering our work on each major government department. It summarises our work on the Department for Work and Pensions during 2013-14.
The Department for Work & Pensions should have increased its focus on Housing Benefit fraud and error sooner, and is now facing an escalating problem.
After a poor start, the performance of the Work Programme is at similar levels to previous programmes but is less than original forecast. The Department has struggled to improve outcomes for harder-to-help groups. The Programme has the potential to offer value for money if it can achieve the higher rates of performance the Department now expects.
For the first time since 2009-10, the Social Fund White Paper account has not been qualified on the grounds of the completeness, existence and valuation of the debt balance.
The Comptroller and Auditor General has qualified his audit opinion owing to the material level of fraud and error in benefit expenditure.
The DWP has simplified the way it administers child maintenance and is approaching expected levels of performance. But overall objectives might be at risk if the number of people using family-based arrangements does not increase.