Call to establish social welfare fraud squad similar to the CAB model

caseyann

MIDDLE-RANKING gardaí want a social welfare fraud unit, modelled on the Criminal Assets Bureau, to be set up.

Instead of the Government looking at public sector cutbacks, we should be looking at wastage right across the public service, including social welfare fraud," said AGSI general secretary Joe Dirwan

He said the Minister for Social Protection Joan Burton had suggested social welfare fraud was costing around €300 million a year.

Sgt Tully there are people engaged in benefit fraud as a criminal career, in addition to people coming into the country and defrauding state benefit.

He said those engaged in benefit fraud are often involved in other types of fraud, which the unit could also investigate.

They have identified people engaged in multiple claiming or impersonating others, foreign nationals who are not resident here and claiming benefit and people abusing disability fraud as problem areas.

He added that if numbers were cut to 13,000, recruitment would have to begin well before AGSI claims that it could be 2020 before there are any new Garda graduates.

I think best idea they ever had,and should have been done along time ago.
Now if they start the ball rolling is another matter altogether.
I dont know if this has been posted already,sorry if it has.
How can our country not have had these strict enforcements made when they opened the borders so easily,and they also could locate some bogus doctors who are saying people are ill when they are not.
http://irishexaminer.com/ireland/crime/call-to-establish-social-welfare-fraud-squad-similar-to-the-cab-model-152082.html

Irish Fire

It would cost them too much money to set it up

caseyann

Irish Fire wrote: »

It would cost them too much money to set it up

oh god dont be thinking like that lol
At least would create jobs?

Outkast_IRE

Isnt this the sort of situation where a few good units of men working on this would easily pay for themselves by saving welfare money and acting as a detterent to future activity.

MagicSean

I would be very surprised if fraud was limited to €300 million. Per month maybe.

MagicSean

caseyann wrote: »

oh god dont be thinking like that lol
At least would create jobs?

It wouldn't have to create jobs. They could just retrain some of the excess staff in other departments of the PS. Make it more efficient.

Icepick

caseyann wrote: »

Instead of the Government looking at public sector cutbacks, we should be looking at wastage right across the public service, including social welfare fraud," said AGSI general secretary Joe Dirwan

No, not instead of.

PeteHeat

Typical bu** s### welfare fraud was always a crime why weren't the Gardai doing anything about when they had the manpower?

It's nothing new welfare fraud was rampant in the 80's sometimes because people had to exageerate claims to get enough money to survive so the smart ones found the loop holes that made it more beneficial to work the welfare system than look for a job.

The system invites fraud by not being transparent / honest enough so many people must study the system to get their entitlements, as they study it they again find the loop holes.

Think of how many different departments are doing the same job for example the means test (which is where many of the foreign claimants would come in) why not streamline the system or at least have the department computers "talking" to each other?

Nothing too complicated there just give microsoft a call I expect they may already have a system or program to make our welfare system more efficient and close the loop holes.

enda_4

Outkast_IRE wrote: »

Isnt this the sort of situation where a few good units of men working on this would easily pay for themselves by saving welfare money and acting as a detterent to future activity.

+1

I have heard of certain stations who assigned Gardai to this and the savings outweighed the costs. The difficulty I think is prosecuting the offenders

Sleepy

Icepick wrote: »

No, not instead of.

Exactly. Needs to be done *in addition to* other cost-savings measures.

Nijmegen

...Crap, the web ate my reply... Try number 2:

I think this is a good idea. The CAB has a budget of €8 million or so per year, with a little over 50 employees - Gardai and civil servants - and over 60% of its budget spent on wages.

Welfare fraud is estimated to be costing the state between €2-3bn, according to a Prime Time report in 2009 that the Department didn't say was way out of line. That's €160 to €250 million per month, 10 - 15% of social welfare.

In other words, you could have a welfare fraud department costing €8 million a month and it'd save us money.

I have heard of certain stations who assigned Gardai to this and the savings outweighed the costs. The difficulty I think is prosecuting the offenders

You need to chase it up in a systemic fashion. One Garda working in isolation is not as effective as a team with many fields of expertise and tools at their disposal. And I would say that prosecutions are secondary: Saving money is primary.

dan_d

I'll help.

It'll take me off SW.I'll do it...filing, organising, answering phonecalls - I'm there.

To be honest it's a good (and necessary) idea, but I wonder why the Gardai have to do it? Revenue look after their own affairs and appear to be pretty successful. Why does it have to be a Garda unit?

MagicSean

PeteHeat wrote: »

Typical bu** s### welfare fraud was always a crime why weren't the Gardai doing anything about when they had the manpower?

It's nothing new welfare fraud was rampant in the 80's sometimes because people had to exageerate claims to get enough money to survive so the smart ones found the loop holes that made it more beneficial to work the welfare system than look for a job.

The system invites fraud by not being transparent / honest enough so many people must study the system to get their entitlements, as they study it they again find the loop holes.

Think of how many different departments are doing the same job for example the means test (which is where many of the foreign claimants would come in) why not streamline the system or at least have the department computers "talking" to each other?

Nothing too complicated there just give microsoft a call I expect they may already have a system or program to make our welfare system more efficient and close the loop holes.

Gardaí don't have access to the social welfare data. Social welfare are supposed to handle their own investigations. There wouldn't be any problem getting Gardaí to do it if they were given the resources.

jakdelad

would that mean scumbags would not be able to draw the dole in 17 different places??
or fiddling the childrens allowence and sending it all abroad

dont mind the cost get the dole cab up and running

Nijmegen

A 'CAB like' unit, like CAB, could consist of people from multiple agencies. Social welfare. Garda fraud experts. Outside experts in this field.

dvpower

enda_4 wrote: »

+1

I have heard of certain stations who assigned Gardai to this and the savings outweighed the costs. The difficulty I think is prosecuting the offenders

When did the Gardai assign resources to SW fraud? It's not their remit. I don't even know where the AGSI get the idea that a CAB type organisation is required - I havent heard it from the social welfare, and if something is required, it should probably be led by them.

Is this just the AGSI pitching for new work?

Delancey

dvpower wrote: »

Is this just the AGSI pitching for new work?

No , it's the AGSI suggesting that Welfare Fraud has got the country in the mess it's in and trying to deflect attention from the excessive wages paid to public servants like Gardai - where else would policemen acting as ministerial drivers get salaries of 70 - 80,000 Euro p.a. ?

Nijmegen

dvpower wrote: »

When did the Gardai assign resources to SW fraud? It's not their remit. I don't even know where the AGSI get the idea that a CAB type organisation is required - I havent heard it from the social welfare, and if something is required, it should probably be led by them.

Is this just the AGSI pitching for new work?

The same department of social welfare that has presided over the €2-3bn in welfare fraud a year to date?

Yes, I'd trust them to fix it on their own......

PeteHeat

If the inefficiencies in the Social Welfare system were addressed the fraud rate would drop substantially, that is without any extra enforcement teams regardless of where they are drawn from.

Our P.P.S. number system was supposed to have all relevent information available to every government department very similar your Microsoft product code for any of their software products, easy to track and trace & Anti fraud.

Of course if the Government departments were made efficient by eliminating duplication we would have even more people on the unemployed register, too much beaurocracy is leaving the system open to abuse.

Governments do not do simple transparent systems where those in need have clear access to their entitlements, it's not in their nature be it Ireland or any "modern democracy".

dvpower

Nijmegen wrote: »

The same department of social welfare that has presided over the €2-3bn in welfare fraud a year to date?

Yes, I'd trust them to fix it on their own......

But why give the job to the Gardai? Haven't they 'presided' over a whole swathe of other crimes? :rolleyes:

There are some very easy ways of dealing with SW fraud, if the will was there, by matching up various government databases (income tax, social welfare, VRT, motor tax, stamp duty ...).

wellieboot

dvpower wrote: »

But why give the job to the Gardai? Haven't they 'presided' over a whole swathe of other crimes? :rolleyes:

There are some very easy ways of dealing with SW fraud, if the will was there, by matching up various government databases (income tax, social welfare, VRT, motor tax, stamp duty ...).

Did you not read the Data Protection Commissioners report issued yesterday?

Down with this sort of thing

Rawhead

Delancey wrote: »

No , it's the AGSI suggesting that Welfare Fraud has got the country in the mess it's in and trying to deflect attention from the excessive wages paid to public servants like Gardai - where else would policemen acting as ministerial drivers get salaries of 70 - 80,000 Euro p.a. ?

Don't forget that all ministerial drivers retire on a superintendents pension scale. Think it's a form of official state incentive to stop them going writing books about all the stuff they would have heard over the years.

Can you imagine the book deal Bertie's driver would get.....

dvpower

wellieboot wrote: »

Did you not read the Data Protection Commissioners report issued yesterday?

Down with this sort of thing

I don't think we should decide not to use the data we have just because some people might abuse it.

dan_d

PeteHeat wrote: »

Of course if the Government departments were made efficient by eliminating duplication we would have even more people on the unemployed register, too much beaurocracy is leaving the system open to abuse.

Governments do not do simple transparent systems where those in need have clear access to their entitlements, it's not in their nature be it Ireland or any "modern democracy".

Change that to the Irish Gov.I have first hand knowledge of the French, German and Spanish systems - they work and everything is linked.Everything. Everyone has an ID card - there's no Data Protection Act rubbish going on there. You have a country with that many people in it, the only way for it to run smoothly is for a centralised system, with ID cards and ID numbers (well, at the very least, ID numbers). The biggest failing of the whole system in this country is that it is not centralised or linked in any way. They make it difficult for those who use it and difficult for those who administer it.

To me, it absolutely beggars belief that we haven't got a centralised IT system with everyone's details in one place....PPSN, employment status, residential status, tax status, familial/marital status. We're advocating ourselves as an IT friendly country, trying to become a world leader in cloud computing and other IT areas and our own Government and public service is operating a system based back in the 90's which is not linked between depts.

Astounding.:rolleyes:

srsly78

In Germany tax and welfare inspectors work on a commission basis. You can guess how well they perform.

keithclancy

dan_d wrote: »

Change that to the Irish Gov.I have first hand knowledge of the French, German and Spanish systems - they work and everything is linked.Everything. Everyone has an ID card - there's no Data Protection Act rubbish going on there. You have a country with that many people in it, the only way for it to run smoothly is for a centralised system, with ID cards and ID numbers (well, at the very least, ID numbers). The biggest failing of the whole system in this country is that it is not centralised or linked in any way. They make it difficult for those who use it and difficult for those who administer it.

To me, it absolutely beggars belief that we haven't got a centralised IT system with everyone's details in one place....PPSN, employment status, residential status, tax status, familial/marital status. We're advocating ourselves as an IT friendly country, trying to become a world leader in cloud computing and other IT areas and our own Government and public service is operating a system based back in the 90's which is not linked between depts.

Astounding.:rolleyes:

You what ...

I'm living in Holland and working in Germany, cannot even get an ID card without being a German/Dutch Citizen in either country.

Its ILLEGAL for a Dutch doctor to even give a sick note for your employer, for me to call in sick takes upto 2 weeks as it involves 2 agencies in between.

Germans have privacy rights up the yazoo, if you get a speeding ticket for example, the picture can only show the driver and not the passenger.

Leads to things like this:
http://boingboing.net/2008/10/27/german-traffic-cops.html

Nothing is linked, the Landhauptstadt have no direct data links with the Tax Authorities, its all based on your tax card which is just a piece of paper.

The German taxation system is an inefficent joke of a setup, the Irish system is LIGHT years ahead.

enda_4

PeteHeat wrote: »

If the inefficiencies in the Social Welfare system were addressed the fraud rate would drop substantially, that is without any extra enforcement teams regardless of where they are drawn from.

In an ideal world, but the rate things get done in this country how long would it take to implement an efficient system. This is what should be done but I don't see it happening anytime soon. For now a team of Gardai to cut out some of the existing fraud and deter some potential fraudsters would be a start.

As far as the commission goes, that would be abused the same as everything else with personal vendetta's etc coming into play

ardmacha

The German taxation system is an inefficent joke of a setup, the Irish system is LIGHT years ahead.

I have the impression, anecdotally, that the Irish Revenue are good users of IT, but that Social Welfare are not so well organised.

donkey balls

I happen to know someone who deals with fraud within the DSW they told me that the number of officers in that particular dept has dropped:eek:,Also the Revenue dept/DSW&HSE systems are linked so at anytime they can see what a person is claiming.

BehindTheScenes

I'm all in favour of this. The direction for this though should come from the minister in charge as legislation may need to be introduced or adjusted.

I'm surprised to hear a gard looking for extra work though as Drumm Fingleton et al have yet to be charged with anything. If anything the snails pace with which this investigation is taking place surely suggests that they are understaffed .

_Kaiser_

dvpower wrote: »

I don't think we should decide not to use the data we have just because some people might abuse it.

Unfortunately in this country it's a good thing BECAUSE we (as a nation) can't be trusted to conduct ourselves properly and professionally.

Look at the attitude you get from the Gardai as it is to incidents - ranging from flat abuse to pure disinterest to the genuine minority that take the job and responsibility of being a Garda seriously, and not an excuse to break the traffic laws on a whim, abuse the general public, and get free entry into discos.

Same thing applies to the Social Welfare, the HSE - hell just about any "Irish" (or formerly Irish) operation you can think of! - it all depends on who you get on that day!! :mad:

If there IS to be any sort of "special unit" setup I'd rather it was completely independent of any of our "authorities" because they've proven time and again that as organisations they're just not up to the task!

dvpower

Kaiser2000 wrote: »

If there IS to be any sort of "special unit" setup I'd rather it was completely independent of any of our "authorities" because they've proven time and again that as organisations they're just not up to the task!

But your new independent authority won't suffer from the same disease?

edanto

One of the first and easiest things to reduce would have to be the multiple sign ons. If people are signing on with forged identities - surely that could be easily stopped by having a fingerprint scanning device at every post office and social welfare counter.

Even if 10% of the fraud is people with multiple identities, that's still €30m a year - and you'd have to be able to buy a nationwide, reliable, secure system for that much and then you're saving that much every year.

Goes without saying that if such a system is built, it should be designed to integrate with the holy grail of government systems with a record about us all based on PPS number.