Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask His Majesty's Government, following the publication on 26 March of Spring Statement 2025: policy costings, what the (1) purpose, and (2) cost, of the 500 additional new fraud and error staff will be; and where these staff will be recruited from.

At the Spring Statement 2025, it was announced that DWP will provide additional resourcing to action data alerts which will enable the Department to detect and correct under- and over-payments. The cost of these staff actioning these data alerts comes from a package of £80m out to 29/30 to support this measure and expected to generate AME savings of £245m by 29/30. Recruitment options are being considered but will likely include some redeployment of existing operational staff.