Question to the Cabinet Office:

To ask Her Majesty's Government, further to the remarks by Lord Agnew of Oulton on 24 January (HL Deb, col 21) where he stated that "total fraud loss across government is estimated at £29 billion a year", whether they will provide a list containing details of that loss.

The 2019-20 Fraud Landscape Report Bulletin, (which predates the pandemic), states that our best estimate of total fraud and error losses to Government are between £29bn and £52bn per year. This comprises the published estimates for fraud and error loss in tax and welfare, and an estimate for the rest of the system where the level is less well known.

For the 'rest of Government' (i.e. outside DWP and HMRC) the proportion of the estimate is between £2.5bn and £25bn a year. The ‘rest of Government’ estimate is overseen by an independent Oversight Board and built from a group of completed fraud and error measurement exercises done over the past 5 years.