Schemes led by the Department of Social Protection to combat fraud in the social welfare system have resulted in savings of €345m.
Minster for Social Protection Joan Bruton TD, is adamant to combat fraud and said it is a “key priority” she has set the Department.
One Parent Family payments accounted for over €101m in savings, €84m worth of pensions savings were made, over €49m savings were made in illness payments, €46m in savings from Jobseekers claims were made, while there was almost €19m savings in Child Benefit payments.
The Minister has also announced that a new scheme will be launched in the coming month to deal with the prevention, deterrence and detection of social welfare fraud.
Members of the public are also being encouraged to report any suspected cases of social welfare fraud and to provide as much detail about the case they are reporting. This can be done anonymously.
Reporting of welfare fraud has increased in recent years from 1,044 reported cases in 2008 to 12,648 anonymous reports in 2010.