asked the Minister for Social Welfare if any surveys have been conducted by his Department into the extent of over-claim of (a) unemployment assistance (b) unemployment benefit (c) disability benefit (d) unmarried mothers' allowance (e) deserted wife's allowance (f) free electricity allowance (g) free TV licence and (h) free telephone rental; if so, the general results of such surveys; the action he proposes to take; if any surveys have been conducted by his Department into the non-take-up of (a), (b), (c) and (d) above; and if he will make a statement on the matter.
Ceisteanna-Questions. Oral Answers. - Social Welfare Over-claims.
65.
The Department's system of accepting, processing and reviewing claims contains a large number of checks and controls designed to prevent abuse of the schemes. When incidents of abuse are discovered, the lessons learned are used to tighten up whatever weaknesses there may be in the control procedures. Consultants were commissioned in August 1986 to examine the major payment systems in the Department with a view to advising where they were most at risk. Arising out of the consultants' reports on these matters a formal survey of disability and unemployment payments was conducted by the Department in 1987. Sampling based exercises where carried out to estimate the level of fraud. The exercise was very time consuming and for this reason was confined to the Dublin area. The results indicated that 1 per cent of disability claims and 2 per cent of unemployment claims exhibited evidence of fraud the degree of which varied from claim to claim. In money terms the loss involved was estimated at £3.66 million a year in Dublin for the two schemes. It is the intention that the sampling technique will be used in the future as a control feature in the Department's ongoing monitoring of schemes.
The consultants' reports on the disability benefit and unemployment benefit schemes also indicated that the schemes were at risk to fraudulent abuse at a number of points. They made a large number of recommendations ranging from organisational matters to changes in particular controls and procedures. I am having these reports examined and will shortly be making proposals to the Government.
As to the other schemes mentioned there have been no formal surveys but the proposals I will be making will affect the whole way in which the Department administer their schemes and services and will be putting an emphasis on providing a comprehensive local service at all the Department's offices.
This reorganised delivery system will play an integral role not only in allowing more effective control of all the schemes but will also make the whole range of the Department's services more accessible to everybody. While no surveys have been conducted by the Department into the non-take-up of schemes, the plans I have for the Department will help considerably in meeting whatever problems there may be in this regard.
Would the Minister not accept that his figure of 1 per cent fraud in DB is patently absurd particularly given that we know our level of absenteeism is twice that of the rate in Britain and our level of claim of disability benefit is almost twice that of the UK rate? Would the Minister not agree, therefore, that there is ample evidence of over-claim and would he tell the House if he has any other explanation for the difference between the UK rate and ours?
There is a very important difference. As the Deputy is aware, Great Britain and Northern Ireland have gone over to payment of disability and sickness benefit through employers for the first 28 weeks. As the Deputy knows, the Government propose to introduce a 13 week period here. This has been found to greatly reduce the level of absenteeism but the Deputy should be clear about the reply which I gave. He asked me if any surveys have been conducted and I mentioned in my answer specific surveys. It was not a question about what savings could be effected. This is hard core fraud which has been discovered by consultants in surveys. The question of wider scale abuse or misuse is a separate one and I think we have discussed it fairly often here.
In my question I asked the Minister about the degree of over-claim and he has now acknowledged that the rate of claim for disability benefit in the UK is half of what it is here. Obviously, we are paying out twice as much disability benefit than we ought to by British standards. The Minister has told us that a survey has produced evidence of abuse of 1 per cent. Surely, the survey is not worth the paper it is written on.
I have given these figures previously. The survey showed a rate of 1 per cent to 2 per cent of hard core fraud in Dublin, so the figure would have to be multiplied to give a countrywide figure. The suspect area ranged up to 7 per cent.
That disposes of questions for today.
Would the Minister confirm that the rate here is 11.5 per cent whereas the British rate is 6 per cent? Could the Minister give us any explanation as to why this is so?