In a series of articles, Mark Rowe reviews the progress of the Labour Government so far, in terms of crime prevention.
While the Crime and Policing Bill is Labourโs first, and therefore presumably best, effort to address what ministers variously describe as an โepidemicโ or โcrisisโ of violent crime, other, less prominent Bills are going ahead. Such as the Public Authorities (Fraud, Error and Recovery) Bill. It would introduce powers to make the Public Sector Fraud Authority a separate body from the Cabinet Office, where it sits, to investigate public sector fraud outside of the tax and social security system; and powers for the Department for Work and Pensions to address fraud and error in the social security system. PSFA authorised investigators would have power to enter and search premises subject to a court warrant; and would be able to seize material. Secretary of State for Work and Pensions Liz Kendall hailed it for โturning off the tap to criminals who cheat the systemโ.
A cross-party committee of MPs looking at the Public Authorities (Fraud, Error and Recovery) Bill on February 25 brought up covid loan fraud; the Bill would double the time limit for civil claims against covid fraud from six to 12 years. Georgia Gould, Minister in the Cabinet Office, described this as part of โtough new powersโ. While Labour while campaigning before the July 2024 election promised to go after covid loan fraudsters, those giving evidence to MPs at committee stage gave no indication that the authorities can recover covid loan fraud; whether due to lack of police capacity (hence the extra proposed powers for the PSFA), or the trail going cold.
Alex Rothwell, Chief Executive, of the NHS Counter Fraud Authority, admitted generally that โfrankly, policing had significant challenges with fraud, and still does, in terms of the volume of attacks against individuals and businesses, which made supporting the public sector almost an impossible askโ. He spoke of taking โa cost-benefit approach as well; although there is a moral imperative, we increasingly look at things in a commercial sense and at whether there is financial value in recovering fundsโ. Kristin Jones likewise stressed itโs โvery difficult to get money back from fraudsters, especially where it is organised, because the money disappears into different accounts in different names, and overseas through lots of corporate bodiesโ.
On data, Alex Rothwell pointed to โrich data sets that the Government actually hold and our ability to communicate inter-department. Those data sets are critical, yet it is still challenging to obtain data. In many ways, the data protection legislation already provides the ability to share information, particularly where fraud is concerned, although the application of it is often quite risk averse. I wish it had been called the Data Sharing Act and not the Data Protection Actโ.
Staying with data, Rothwell pointed out that โvery few transactions, if any, take place that do not have a digital or electronic footprint of some kindโ, which would give authorities scope for โdata analysisโ. Rothwell spoke of the gain lately from โa ubiquitous case recording system that exists across the national health serviceโ, and โimproved data analysis on large datasets that exist on, for example, national contractingโ. Earlier in his evidence, however, he warned of โincreasingly limited opportunities to pursue criminal investigations. Although we [the NHS CFA] maintain a strong investigative capability that deals with more serious types of criminality, we know about the challenges in the criminal justice system โ the disclosure burden is high, it is incredibly expensive to run criminal investigations, and often they take eight years or longer to reach fruition โ so we are increasingly looking at how else we can deal with fraud when it is presented to usโ.
In other words, we can say, weaknesses in the overall public sector โ in this case, the courts backlog โ makes a mockery of work earlier in the criminal justice chain. To return to Mr Rothwell, he told MPs that โin many ways, it is the low-value, high-volume cases that we see that are more challenging, where we are perhaps seeking to recover funds from someone who has taken ยฃ5,000โ. We might add that criminals can learn or sense this; and carry out frauds below that rough threshold accordingly, that arenโt worth the authoritiesโ while to go after.
Mr Rothwell, formerly a senior policeman, made the broader point that police this century has placed an โemphasis on drug supply, knife crime and firearmsโ, which has meant โlittle capacity in policing to tackle public sector fraudโ. In a public order or terrorism or other crisis, โcrimes like fraud are perhaps easier to put on hold for a timeโ.
Kristin Jones, formerly of the Serious Fraud Office and the Crown Prosecution Service, in giving evidence to MPs alongside Mr Rothwell made a more profound point still: โThe worry is that the public are exposed so much to fraud that its seriousness gets watered down in their mind. You have these [online] forums where you can recommend how to claim various things from the Government and how to hit sweet spots to get that benefit or grant. So it has changed and perhaps people are not as shocked by fraud as they used to be.โ
This suggestion that wrong-doing has become the norm โ โwhen you answer your telephone, there is a good chance you have a scammer at the other endโ, as Kristin Jones said – had an echo in a debate by members of Parliament last Thursday afternoon, March 20, on knife crime and young people. The Conservative MP Ben Obese-Jecty, opening the debate, described his time in Haringay, โan area of London where murders and stabbings become so commonplace as to elicit little more than a shrug from local residents; where police tape closing a road or a local park is normalised to the point of merely being an inconvenience; where the murder of a child does not make the national newsโ.
Replying to the debate, Home Office minister Dame Diana Johnson spoke of how, โunder the safer streets mission led by the Home Secretary, we are driving a whole-of-Government approach to halving violence against women and girls, halving knife crime, and restoring confidence in the policing and justice systemโ. She summed up that such crime was a โnational crisis. The public want change and we are determined to deliver it.โ
