At the last Audit & Governance meeting the committee received a Fraud Briefing from the audit Commission. Fascinating. Pages 8-28 in the committee papers.

It highlighted that fraud involving people wrongly claiming Single Persons Discount on Council Tax has been found to typically run at 4% and this would mean Southwark can expect to find another £400,000 of fraud if its looks.

Illegal council housing tenancies – people sub letting or fraudulantly claiming things about housing that are not true. Southwark has found its the 3rd highest ratio of this compared to other local authorities finding 170/40,000 council let properties. However, during major evacuations a far higher proportion of illegal letting has been found. The committee has asked for more information around this.

One London local authority discovered 13 cases of fruad around social services. Southwark has found none. Is it plausible Southwark has none?

Procurement fraud. Southwark has reported zero cases of procurement fraud where 31 such cases have been found in inner London boroughs. Again is it plausible that Southwark actually has zero cases?

Blue badge fraud. Southwark has reported finding two cases of Blue Badge fraud in financial year 09/10. Whereas a neighbouring borough has reported 171 such case. Again is it really true Southwark only had 2 such cases?

Recruitment fraud. The Audit commission stated “Evidence from council who employ enhance vetting procedures indicate your [Southwark] deated fraud cases could be just the tipe of the iceberg in terms of the total amount of recruitment fraud targeted against your Council”.

Whistleblowing. Southwark doesn’t record the amount of whistle blowing so doesn’t know if its policies are successful. A neighbouring borough recorded 50 cases.

So overall Southwark doesn’t appear to have grasped the fact that fraud will be taking place and hunting it down.