Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, with reference to paragraph 6.18 of the Autumn Budget 2017, how much the Government plans to invest in better use of data to ensure that fraudulent and error-related payments are reduced; and over what period that investment will be made.

The Autumn Budget 2017 announcement enables DWP to continue to make more effective use of HMRC’s Real Time Information data in respect of Housing Benefit and Carer’s Allowance.

We plan to invest an additional £90m over a 5 year period beginning 2018/19 which will help identify earnings related fraud and error.