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Mr. Jenkin: If the hon. Gentleman studies Hansard, he will find that I more or less made that point just before he intervened.
Mr. Field: The hon. Gentleman does not have to admit that, if he changes Hansard.
Mr. Jenkin: I am shocked that the hon. Gentleman should suggest that I should commit such a fraud on the House. I am gratified to see that he is jesting, and I accept his unreserved apology.
Ms Liz Lynne (Rochdale): We must remember that social security fraud is not a victimless crime. Someone else has to pay for it--the taxpayer--so any clampdown on benefit fraud is welcome. We must, however, have safeguards.
As we all know, fraud is a widespread criminal activity. It is estimated that, this year alone, £4 billion has gone on benefit fraud and that only £1 billion of that is detected, so, each year, £3 billion goes undetected. The Government are now tackling benefit fraud, which I welcome, but, in part, they were responsible for its increase, particularly because of the cut in home visits. In 1979-80, there were 6.5 million home visits. In 1994-95, that went down to less than half a million, so it is hardly surprising that, as home visits went down, benefit fraud went up, or that many people were fiddling the system.
Most of the specific provisions in the Bill are sensible, modest and much needed. Clause 6, for instance, gives the Audit Commission powers to help the Secretary of State for Social Security in studies to improve the administration of housing and council tax benefits. That will be of tremendous help to local authorities in particular.
Local authorities have differing rates of success in tackling housing benefit fraud. The unit for the study of white collar crime said--I would like to blow the Liberal Democrat's trumpet about it--that Liberal Democrat local authorities have the best record of tackling housing benefit crime. Perhaps that is because we have had investigators in place for a little longer than some other authorities. We have to improve on that record, even though it is extremely good at the moment.
Mr. Bernard Jenkin:
I do not want to spoil the hon. Lady's fun, but in Colchester the Liberal Democrat authority was recently highlighted as having lost about £500,000 on housing benefit fraud. I know that it is now taking that very seriously, but I do not think that the Liberal Democrats have a universally unblemished record on the matter.
Ms Lynne:
I am not saying that we have an unblemished record, but, according to the unit for the study of white-collar crime for the Liverpool business school at Liverpool John Moores university, we have a better record than Conservative or Labour-controlled councils. If the hon. Gentleman would like to see a copy of the report, I would be very glad to give him one. I do not believe that any local authority has an unblemished record; all local authorities could do better. All I am pointing out is that Liberal Democrats have quite a good record because of the investigators who are already in place. Of course, we have to build on that success.
One of the Bill's main aspects is the lifting of barriers between Departments so that information can be shared, which I welcome. Data-matching can be highly effective. I also believe that caution is needed to prevent the misuse of confidential information. There ought to be more liaison between Departments. I asked the Home Office not so long ago for statistics on prosecution for organised
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Another part of the Bill gives local authorities and the Department of Social Security access to the Post Office database for redirection of mail. The assistant registrar to the Data Protection Registrar expressed concern about that, saying that, unless data matching techniques were supported by skilled human intervention and adequate safeguards, there could be problems.
I should like to give the House an example of the possible problems. I hope that the Minister will give a reassurance on safeguards in his winding-up speech. Say, for instance, that a husband is working in a DSS department and the wife has been the victim of domestic abuse by the husband. She moves and has her mail redirected. We need to ensure that there are safeguards to prevent the husband from being able to tap into that information for purely personal reasons and find out where his ex-wife has moved to.
I should like some reassurance from the Minister that that cannot happen, and that, if it does, there will be safeguards or rules to ensure double checking within Departments on why the person needs the information.
So many other problems could arise. People could misuse information for criminal activity. We need to ensure that Departments and people who work in them do not tap into the database to get information to sell on. I know that some Departments have been worrying about that already. When the Bill is passed, as it undoubtedly will be, we need to know that there will be safeguards against such activity.
The point made by the hon. Member for Peckham (Ms Harman) has been raised by Age Concern in particular. If data matching can be used to check fraud, why can it not also be used to ensure that people, especially pensioners, receive the entitlements that they should receive? There should be a benefit take-up campaign at the same time. More than 1 million pensioners are not getting the income support or income-related benefit to which they are entitled. If they do not receive income support, they cannot receive cold weather payments either. About £1 billion goes unclaimed. Given what is already in the Bill, the Government could act to include such a measure in its remit.
When I asked the Under-Secretary about the take-up during Social Security questions, I was very disappointed with the reply. He said:
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Mr. Heald:
How does the hon. Lady think that the data matching process she suggests could identify pensioners who are entitled to income support but do not claim it?
Ms Lynne:
If one is data matching, one has records of people's pension entitlements. Surely the information about the entitlement to income support of women who reach the age of 60 and men who reach 65 can be data-matched.
Mr. Heald:
I am asking how we would know. Clearly we know who the pensioners are and who is entitled to a retirement pension. We also know various other classes of information, but none of them will tell us that somebody was entitled to income support.
Ms Lynne:
The Minister is saying that we cannot use data matching for anything but benefit fraud. I do not understand his argument. If we can use it for detecting benefit fraud, it can surely be used to find out which pensioners are entitled to income support. I know that it will be difficult to trawl through the system, but I am sure that, with all the resources at their disposal, the Government can come up with some positive proposals.
If the Government cannot do so in order that the problem can be solved in the Bill, perhaps the Minister can come forward with some idea of what take-up campaign he will put in place. There is no point in dismissing the matter out of hand. Many pensioners are not getting the income-related benefits or the cold-weather payments to which they are entitled. I am asking the Minister whether he thinks that such a measure could be included in the Bill. If he rules it out, fine, but he must at least admit that some take-up campaign must take place.
Mr. Stern:
The hon. Lady is placing far too great a reliance on data matching, and making the same mistake as the hon. Member for Peckham (Ms Harman). A typical pensioner could be receiving a state pension and a small occupational pension from a totally different source, and possibly have some savings income from the National Savings bank. No data matching system will bring that information together, because most of it is not declarable.
Ms Lynne:
The hon. Gentleman says that it is not possible to data-match in the Bill as I have suggested, and that data matching will not work. Does he therefore agree with me and other hon. Members that some take-up campaign is necessary? If the objective cannot be achieved through data matching, it has to be achieved in some way. I thought that there might be a possibility of achieving it in the Bill. If the hon. Gentleman and the Minister rule it out completely, what other suggestions do they have for a take-up campaign?
"It may create serious adverse consequences,"
he said.
"No other strategy would work better than what we are doing."--[Official Report, 12 November 1996; Vol. 285, c. 146.]
When £1 billion is not being claimed, I do not honestly believe that the strategy is really working. All parties must address the problem, and the Government must address it through a take-up campaign. I believe that measures to solve the problem can be encompassed in the Bill's remit, despite whatever European directives or the European Commission of Human Rights might say.
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