Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 29 November 2022
410. Deputy Peadar Tóibín asked the Minister for Social Protection the estimated total amount in euro that was allegedly taken in fraudulent or suspected fraudulent pandemic unemployment payment, PUP, claims and payments. [58955/22]
View answer411. Deputy Peadar Tóibín asked the Minister for Social Protection if her Department has conducted any investigations into alleged fraud in relation to the PUP; and if so, if she will share the details of such fraud. [58956/22]
View answer412. Deputy Peadar Tóibín asked the Minister for Social Protection the total amount of fraudulent PUP made to persons which have been recouped by the State; her views on a report (details supplied); and if she will make a statement on the matter. [58957/22]
View answerI propose to take Questions Nos. 410, 411 and 412 together.
The Pandemic Unemployment Payment (PUP) was introduced in an extremely short period of time in order to cushion the incomes of citizens who had lost their employment following the onset of an unprecedented public health crisis. Within 3 weeks of the payment being launched over 500,000 people had been paid. The delivery of the scheme on such a scale and in such a short time represented a major achievement by my Department.
Almost 880,000 people received payment under the scheme at a cost of €9.2 billion and a total of 29.7 million payments have issued.
My Department always has to strike a balance between applying tight controls and checks on claims on the one hand and not frustrating a person’s entitlement to a payment on the other. Throughout the Covid crisis, my Department prioritised prompt claim processing and payment in order to ensure that people affected by the pandemic had the security of an income support payment. This was necessary and appropriate in light of the circumstances prevailing. In addition, while prioritising prompt payment in the circumstances of the pandemic, payment and claim processing controls were applied to reduce the risk of incorrect or fraudulent payments. Inevitably, some people will have sought to take advantage of the scheme, but most people, as would be expected, acted honourably and honestly.
A wide range of control work was undertaken during the period of the pandemic, with over 112,000 control reviews completed, including matching against Revenue records, and this work will continue into the future.
My Department follows up on all cases where it is identified that a person has been overpaid PUP and will do so in a measured way. The Department takes a reasonable approach to recovery of sums overpaid where these overpayments are believed to be due to genuine error or oversight by the claimant.
In circumstances where fraud is suspected the Department will seek to prosecute the people involved; a number of prosecutions have been initiated and convictions secured. More cases are being considered for prosecution. Cases can be prosecuted under social welfare or criminal legislation, depending on the circumstances of the case. Criminal prosecutions are brought by An Garda Síochána.
To date just over 19,000 PUP overpayments have been assessed by my Department to a value of €47.8m, with €13.3m recovered. Typically, overpayments have arisen where a person has failed to declare ongoing employment or where the person was not working prior to the pandemic. Of these, just over 1,000 PUP overpayments were considered to have arisen because of suspected fraud and overpayments have been raised to a value of €4.4m with recoveries of €375,000. The Deputy will appreciate that a very high threshold of proof must be met to warrant a finding of fraud.
During the course of the pandemic, a small number of claims for the PUP were identified as being submitted by third parties who were fraudulently in possession of elements of another individual’s Public Sector Identity dataset, through identity phishing or other means of data theft. These third parties directed payment into bank accounts under their control.
From investigations into these cases, it was found that personal data had been obtained and used inappropriately by a person who knew the individual’s personal information; or a person who misled the individual into revealing enough of the data to enable them to make an application; or the theft of individual or groups of individuals details. Cases were investigated by Gardaí seconded to the Department’s Special Investigations Unit in co-operation with the Garda National Economic Crime Bureau and a number of prosecutions have arisen.
I trust that this clarifies matters for the Deputy.
