OF 10,000 cases of social welfare fraud or suspected fraud last year there were just 35 prosecutions, the Dail Public Accounts Committee was told yesterday.
There was a total of £16.4 million in overpayments, of which 70 per cent, or £11.7 million, was fraud, the Comptroller and Auditor General, Mr John Purcell, said. He added that the Department of Social Welfare wrote off two thirds of that amount as irrecoverable.
However, Mr Purcell also pointed to the Government's delay in implementing the EU directive on social welfare payments. It would have cost the State £300 million by the time all the payments were made, he said.
He was referring to the case brought to the European Court over equal social welfare payments for married women.
The Comptroller said he had to draw attention to "executive inaction" in dealing with this. "By the end of this year, £254 million will have been paid out," he said. So far £238.4 million had been paid out, and a further £50.1 million was due.
Referring to the Labour Force Survey by the Central Statistics Office, Mr Purcell said its findings cast serious doubt over the Department of Social Welfare's effectiveness in dealing with fraud. There was a case for a fundamental review. On the basis of the CSO survey, 11.4 per cent of claims were fraudulent and this could work out at £100 million plus.
If the level of detection was "only the tip of the iceberg", which he believed it was, the fraud could be much higher. However, the Secretary of the Department, Mr Edward McCumiskey, said that estimates of £100 million or £600 million in social welfare fraud were speculation and "not justifiable speculation".
He said that before the CSO survey, the Department estimated fraud to be about 5 per cent. He said that the CSO was careful to specify that it was not a fraud survey.
When asked why only 35 cases were prosecuted last year Mr McCumiskey said it was a matter of priorities and cost effectiveness.
In writing off overpayments he said the Department was dealing in general with people with little means, and was also under contradictory pressures "to be tough and recover overpayments" and on the other hand to show compassion.