Louise Haigh – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Louise Haigh on 2015-10-27.

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many cases of debt repayment to his Department have been cancelled in each year since 2010.

Justin Tomlinson

The latest preliminary figures for 2014/15 estimate Fraud and Error levels as £3.2 billion, or 1.9% of benefit expenditure. The net figure after recoveries is £2.3bn, or 1.4%. This means that DWP Fraud and Error is at its lowest ever level.

We have interpreted this question to mean the volume of debts written off since 2010. The totals represent the number of transactions where debts have been written off either in full or in part, i.e. where some element remains recoverable.

The vast majority of these transactions are either cases where the Department has no legal right to recover or overpayments under £65 which are not value for money to pursue.