Asked by: Lord Sikka (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask His Majesty's Government whether they plan to introduce legislation to extend the provisions of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 to include registered political parties.
Answered by Baroness Neville-Rolfe - Minister of State (Cabinet Office)
The Government has no plans to extend the provisions of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 to registered political parties.
Asked by: Lord Sikka (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask His Majesty's Government whether they plan to introduce legislation to require Government departments to inform those affected of any errors and flaws found in the computer information systems that they operate.
Answered by Baroness Neville-Rolfe - Minister of State (Cabinet Office)
There are no plans to introduce new legislation to inform affected citizens of errors in computing and information systems operated by the government. There is existing legislation in the UK General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) pertaining to personal data which protects individuals.
Asked by: Lord Sikka (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask His Majesty's Government whether they plan to publish a list of Post Office directors who have been recommended for honours by the Prime Minister since 2010.
Answered by Baroness Neville-Rolfe - Minister of State (Cabinet Office)
A full list of honours recipients is published biannually and these are therefore a matter of public record.
The Government does not routinely publish a list of names broken down by sector and there are currently no plans to publish a list of Post Office directors.
The Government is aware that there is increased interest and speculation surrounding honours relating to the Post Office inquiry. We will not speculate or provide commentary on any individual cases: these are confidential.
Asked by: Lord Sikka (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask His Majesty's Government to provide a list of government departments that use Fujitsu designed software; and whether any operating errors have been reported.
Answered by Baroness Neville-Rolfe - Minister of State (Cabinet Office)
The Cabinet Office does not hold a central register of software being used across Government.
The Central Digital and Data Office (CDDO), in the Cabinet Office, is responsible for supporting departments to build and operate modern, state of the art, highly responsive and cost effective technology that meets the needs of our end users and delivers the cross-government digital strategy.
CDDO operates a delegated assurance process which reviews proposed projects for value for money as well as alignment to standards and policies. Once projects are approved, contracts are awarded by individual departments. Projects meeting specific criteria are also reviewed by CDDO experts. Details of central government contracts where the contract value is above £12,000 are published on Contracts Finder: https://www.contractsfinder.service.gov.uk/Search
Asked by: Lord Sikka (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask His Majesty's Government how many contracts they have currently open with Fujitsu, and what their value is.
Answered by Baroness Neville-Rolfe - Minister of State (Cabinet Office)
This information is not centrally held by the Cabinet Office. However, details of central Government contracts with values above £12,000 are published on Contracts Finder: https://www.contractsfinder.service.gov.uk/Search.
To collate all of this information would incur a disproportionate cost to the department, especially as contracts are held and procured across multiple Government departments.
Asked by: Lord Sikka (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask His Majesty's Government when the (1) 2020–21, and (2) 2021–22, editions of the Cross-Government Fraud Landscape Bulletin were or will be published.
Answered by Baroness Neville-Rolfe - Minister of State (Cabinet Office)
The Public Sector Fraud Authority is committed to publishing data promoting transparency and highlighting progress across government to fight fraud against the public sector. Due to a number of factors the publication of the 2020-21 Fraud Landscape Report was delayed. The 2020-21 report has been drafted and will be published shortly.
The data for the 2021-22 Fraud Landscape Report has been collected and is currently being analysed. We will be looking to publish this data in a Fraud Landscape Bulletin in 2023.
Asked by: Lord Sikka (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask His Majesty's Government what was (1) the estimated total amount of fraud and error loss across all government departments, and (2) the breakdown of these losses by each department, in each of the last five years.
Answered by Baroness Neville-Rolfe - Minister of State (Cabinet Office)
The Public Sector Fraud Authority uses annual detected fraud figures and fraud estimates from fraud measurement activity to estimate fraud loss across Government. Due to the nature of this work the estimate for fraud and error levels in the public sector are reported retrospectively. From these calculations we estimate that levels are between 0.5-5% of government expenditure. The Public Sector Fraud Authority estimates that for 2020-21 the levels of fraud against the public sector, including tax and welfare, were between £33-55bn.
This estimate excludes fraud and error within Covid-19 schemes as fraud measurement activity within these schemes is still ongoing. Some departments have published estimates. However, a full picture of fraud and error levels in COVID-19 schemes is not yet available.
Detected fraud figures by department are published annually within the Fraud Landscape Report, this includes 5 year trends for total detected, prevented and recovered fraud and error across government, outside of tax and welfare.
The table below shows a departmental breakdown of detected fraud and error over the last available five years, outside of tax and welfare. Figures for 2020-21 will be published shortly in the 2021 Annual Fraud Landscape report.
Detected Fraud and Error
Department | 2015-2016 | 2016-2017 | 2017-2018 | 2018-2019 | 2019-2020 |
| £m | £m | £m | £m | £m |
BEIS | 17.64 | 13.9 | 8.9 | 12.6 | 17.8 |
CO | 0.48 | 0.1 | 0.1 | 0.05 | 0.04 |
DCMS | 0.6 | 0.2 | 0.75 | 0.43 | 0.34 |
DEFRA | 4.03 | 7.9 | 5.3 | 4.1 | 9.9 |
DFE | 5.99 | 14.1 | 40.7 | 17.2 | 21.2 |
DFID | 5.05 | 18.7 | 6.7 | 9.1 | 15.0 |
DFT | 4.2 | 112 | 13.1 | 61.2 | 28.4 |
DHSC | 7.99 | 21.4 | 14.3 | 9.1 | 21.1 |
DIT |
|
|
| 0.0 | 0.0 |
DLUHC | 0.25 | 0.4 | 0.1 | 36.3 | 0.37 |
DWP* | 0.6 | 0.3 | 0.68 | 0.27 | 0.89 |
FCDO |
|
|
|
| 0.39 |
FCO | 4.89 | 0.5 | 1.2 | 4.1 | 2.8 |
HMRC* | 1.5 | 1.7 | 1.4 | 5.5 | 2.2 |
HMT | 0.22 | 0.1 | 0.19 | 0.0 | 0.18 |
HO | 3.31 | 6.7 | 6.8 | 18.7 | 87.4 |
MOD | 18.27 | 88.6 | 116.9 | 60.2 | 172.4 |
MOJ | 28.79 | 14.1 | 0.76 | 2.5 | 3.5 |
Total | 103.81 | 300.7 | 207.4 | 227.5 | 360.4 |
*Figures for HMRC and DWP include internal fraud and error only. Tax and Welfare fraud figures are collected and reported separately by HMRC and DWP.
Asked by: Lord Sikka (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask His Majesty's Government whether they will publish a table showing the names of the recipients of the Public Duty Cost Allowance, and the amount received by each, since 2010.
Answered by Baroness Neville-Jones
The Public Duty Cost Allowance was introduced to assist former Prime Ministers still active in public life. The Public Duty Cost Allowance is a reimbursement of incurred expenses for necessary office and secretarial costs arising from fulfilling public duties to a maximum of £115,000
The amount claimed by each recipient under the Public Duty Cost Allowance is published each year in the Cabinet Office Annual Reports and Accounts.
Asked by: Lord Sikka (Labour - Life peer)
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.
Answered by Lord True - Leader of the House of Lords and Lord Privy Seal
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.
Asked by: Lord Sikka (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask Her Majesty's Government which government departments do not invite (1) job applicants, and (2) promotion candidates, to provide any information about their ethnicity.
Answered by Lord True - Leader of the House of Lords and Lord Privy Seal
Government departments that use the Government Recruitment Service (GRS) vX recruitment system to track candidates will collect diversity data on all applicants.
Candidates applying on promotion via an external campaign will not be asked questions on their ethnicity. They are, however, expected to complete the diversity questionnaire.