Public Authorities (Fraud, Error and Recovery) Bill

Lord Verdirame Excerpts

Committee stage
Wednesday 25th June 2025 Grand Committee

[Baroness Lister of Burtersett (Lab)]

My Lords, Amendment 123 is supported by the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett of Manor Castle, who is in the Chamber, and the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Leicester, who regrets that he cannot be in his place. He was going to be replaced by the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Manchester but he is also in the Chamber. I thank them anyway for their moral support, even if it cannot be practical. I also thank the Public Law Project for all its help with the amendment. I apologise that I was unable to attend Second Reading, but my noble friend Lord Davies of Brixton kindly gave notice of this amendment.

The amendment brings the test of recovery of universal credit overpayments caused by official error into line with the housing benefit provisions by ensuring that recovery can be made only where the claimant could reasonably have been expected to realise there was an overpayment. There is surely no better time to address official error overpayments in a Bill so appropriately named the “Fraud, Error and Recovery” Bill. However, it is currently one sided. Although it recognises the harms that both fraud and error cause in the social security system, it focuses only on the behaviour of claimants. It does not address the harms that result from the recovery of so-called official error overpayments. These are debts created because of mistakes made by the Department for Work and Pensions.

Unlike many other benefits, DWP can recover official error UC overpayments from claimants. This power was introduced in the Welfare Reform Act 2012 and represented a significant change to the position previously applied to most legacy benefits—that is, those that preceded UC. According to DWP data, in 2023-2024, 686,756 new UC official error overpayment debts were entered on DWP’s debt manager system. Is my noble friend the Minister able to give us any data on the circumstances in which official error overpayments occur and the average length of time before they are identified?

We are not just talking about numbers on a debt manager system. These DWP mistakes are having a serious impact on the lives of individuals such as D, who got in touch with me after hearing my noble friend Lord Davies raise the issue at Second Reading. D emailed me and we had a phone conversation. She told me that after her son was born, she was incorrectly told by DWP that she would be able to claim UC while her partner was studying for a master’s degree. Two years later, the DWP then told her that she was not eligible and that she now owed them £12,000—a “life-changing amount”, in her words. She has tried to dispute this through the tribunal system and the DWP complaints process. But even though the judge in the tribunal was sympathetic, the response has been that the DWP has the power to recover all overpayments, regardless of how they are caused. D now has £20 deducted from each UC payment she receives but no record from the DWP of how much she still owes.

It simply should not be the case that claimants such as D are paying the price for DWP mistakes. Public Law Project research demonstrates that the financial and psychological impact of overpayment debt recovery on individual claimants can be severe and is often associated with a particular sense of injustice. Understandably so, with individuals finding themselves unexpectedly in debt through no fault of their own.

The DWP’s default approach is to recover all overpayments regardless of how they are caused. The onus is on claimants to request discretionary measures, such as a waiver, but the DWP does not automatically tell them this. In 2023-24, only 75 waiver requests were granted; this equates to only 0.01% of overpayment debts registered that year. Could my noble friend tell the Committee what steps, if any, the DWP is taking to make waivers more accessible? In particular, would it consider following the example of the Department for Communities in Northern Ireland and automatically including reference to waivers in communications with claimants? Will it consider lowering the thresholds and evidential requirements to grant waivers?

In the Commons, the Minister referred to measures that were in place to mitigate the risk of harm associated with overpayment recovery. I welcome the introduction of the fair repayment rate, which I am sure my noble friend will mention. However, access to some of these safeguards is not an easy process for claimants to navigate. Moreover, as evidenced by research from the Public Law Project, Citizens Advice, the Trussell Trust and StepChange, and acknowledged by the DWP’s own guidance, those safeguards are not sufficient to prevent harm and hardship.

This was illustrated by a recent report from Policy in Practice about deductions from UC in general. It observed that many low-income households are already in crisis and at risk of deep poverty, prior to the application of deductions. I know that I do not have to explain to my noble friend the difficulties of trying to survive on universal credit and how low it is. That will still be the case despite the welcome, real-terms increase being proposed in the legislation currently before the Commons. Policy in Practice found that deductions risk placing households further from being able to afford the essential items of daily life. This is particularly the case for lone parents and carers.

Citizens Advice reports that fewer than 40% of its clients who contacted the DWP were successful in getting an affordability measure put in place, yet the DWP’s own guidance recognises that any recovery of an overpayment from any person in receipt of benefit is almost certain to cause some hardship and upset for them and their family. What criteria does the DWP use to decide what is an affordable deduction? Would the DWP consider agreeing an affordable and sustainable repayment plan with claimants before initiating recovery by way of deductions?

As I said, overpayment recovery is taking the individual below the amount that the DWP has assessed them to need, in a context where UC rates have already been shown to be insufficient to meet essential needs—a point emphasised by Policy in Practice. This is why I have tabled an amendment to bring the test for recovery of UC overpayments into line with the current test for housing benefit. It would ensure that UC overpayments caused by official error could be recovered only when individuals could reasonably have been expected to have realised that they had been overpaid. It places the onus on DWP officials to consider the fairness of recovery before initiating it. When UC was introduced, the then Labour shadow Minister for Employment considered this a just and fair test, which has been tested in case law.

This amendment would also create a clear incentive for the DWP to prevent these mistakes in the first place, which is a step towards a better-functioning social security system that gets things right first time. We ought to pay attention to the more than 30 charities that have written to the Secretary of State urging the Government to grasp this opportunity.

In introducing the Bill’s Second Reading, my noble friend stated:

“Our approach is tough but fair … fair on claimants, by spotting and stopping errors earlier and helping people to avoid getting into debt. It is fair on those who play by the rules”.—[Official Report, 15/5/25; col. 2346.]


But the current system is patently unfair to those who have been affected by an official error that they could not be expected to spot, and who have played by the rules as they understood them.

This is a fundamental question of fairness and of rights and responsibilities. If a government system makes mistakes, who should bear the consequences? Is it the system that caused the error and has the power to avoid it, or the service user who has no control over, or responsibility for, that mistake and, worse, is detrimentally affected by it? If we are serious about addressing fraud, error and the recovery of debt in the Bill, it would—for want of a better word—be an error on our part not to take action to end this unfair practice and source of economic instability for hundreds of thousands of families and individuals whom our social security system is there to serve. I beg to move.

[Lord Verdirame (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, I will speak in support of the amendment because it raises, as the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, pointed out, a question of principle. Should a person who received payments in error always be required to make restitution in full?

We are dealing with the application of this principle in the context of welfare payments, but it may be useful to keep in mind how this principle would apply in other contexts under our law. The default position is, as one would expect, that a party that has received money in error is obliged to return that money. However, it is also the case that our law has developed an important exception to this general position. This is known as the change of position defence, which was first recognised by Lord Goff in the case Lipkin Gorman v Karpnale Ltd 1991, where he said that

“the defence is available to a person whose position is so changed that it would be inequitable in all the circumstances to require him to make restitution, or alternatively, to make restitution in full”.

In essence, where the person has changed their position, in good faith, in reliance on that payment—for example, by spending it—restitution in a non-welfare context may be denied in whole or in part.

As I said, it is an equitable exception that our law has developed over a number of decades and on the basis of various decisions. It is a complex area of law known as unjust enrichment, on which many doctoral theses have been written. The reason it has attracted so much attention is that there is a conflict of fairness. On the one hand, it seems right that the payer who paid in error should, in principle, receive the money back and that people should not derive benefit from someone else’s innocent error. On the other, it also seems wrong that someone who made no error and relied, in good faith, on that payment should be unduly penalised. The common law and equity seek to strike a balance between these two concerns with the change of position exception that I have outlined.

For welfare payments, we are dealing with a context where statute rather than common law applies; however, it seems that the concerns that the common law has sought to address in other contexts arise even more acutely. The people who received the payments are socioeconomically disadvantaged and very likely to have spent that money, as the case mentioned by the noble Baroness illustrates. Thus, they are very likely to have changed, in good faith, their position by relying on those payments. To ask them to return that money is particularly burdensome on individuals who are on benefits and without a safety net.

Section 71ZB of the Social Security Administration Act, which the amendment proposes to change, seems a very blunt instrument. It responds to that first concern—to ensure that the payer, in this case the taxpayer, should have their money back—but it does nothing to protect the bona fide recipient of that payment from being penalised unduly. For that reason, it seems a fundamentally unfair provision. It seems wrong that the protection that a bona fide recipient of a payment in error would enjoy in other contexts, including a commercial context, should not apply to the bona fide recipient of a welfare payment made in error. This amendment seeks to remedy that unfairness, and it has my support for that reason.

It is true that Section 71ZB gives the Government a discretion and I suppose it will be said that there is guidance that tells the Government to exercise that discretion, taking into account certain circumstances. But the good will of the payer is not sufficient and that certainly is not the position under the general common law on restitution. It is not just a matter of the payer having the good will not to pursue the recovery of the payment; there has to be more to recognise that the innocent beneficiary, too, has an entitlement to protection. It seems to me that this amendment seeks to provide that correction to Section 71ZB of the Social Security Administration Act 1992.

I will, of course, be interested to hear what the Minister has to say about the various mitigations that might exist, but at the moment I agree that, unless the mitigation is in statute, whatever guidance might be in place will not be sufficient. I would also like to take this opportunity to thank the Minister and her officials for the very informative briefing last week.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Palmer of Childs Hill (LD)]

My Lords, Amendments 125A and 129A relate to the prevention of fraud against public authorities, specifically by seeking to make it an explicit offence to facilitate fraud through the dissemination of relevant information online. I welcome these amendments because they deal with deliberate fraud, rather than chasing carers for errors. That is a difference that I would like to accentuate.

The Bill is designed to safeguard public money by reducing public sector fraud, error and debt, introducing new powers for the Public Sector Fraud Authority and enhancing the DWP’s ability to tackle fraud in the social security system. Amendment 125A seeks to strengthen this framework by targeting those who enable fraud through online channels, reflecting the reality that much fraudulent activity today is co-ordinated or facilitated via the internet. By explicitly criminalising the dissemination of information intended to assist fraud, the amendment aims to deter would-be facilitators and close a loophole that modern fraudsters increasingly exploit.

It is important, however, that such measures are balanced with appropriate safeguards to ensure that legitimate online activity is not inadvertently criminalised and that enforcement is both proportionate and effective. The Bill already provides for oversight, reporting mechanisms and independent review to ensure that the new powers are used appropriately. As we consider these amendments, we must ensure that our legislative response to online facilitation of fraud is robust enough to protect public funds while also safeguarding civil liberties and maintaining public confidence in the fairness of our legal system. In this way, I hope that the Bill and its amendments can deliver the Government’s commitment, which I believe they have, to tackle fraud without overreaching or undermining the rights of individuals and organisations operating lawfully online.

This is an important part of our discussions today because we are talking about deliberate fraud in the modern world, including online fraud, and we have had indications of personal situations from other speakers. This is about how things are moving in the digital age. These amendments are an important part of trying to tackle that, and I support them.

[Lord Verdirame (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, I was not planning to speak, but I thought I would say a couple of words. This is an important amendment and I support the objective that it is pursuing, although I also agree with the comments by the noble Baroness, Lady Fox, on being careful about using criminal law to deal with much bigger cultural and social problems.

However, the amendment needs some tightening in the subjective element, because at the moment it punishes a wide range of conduct. At one end of the spectrum, a person would commit an offence if they ought reasonably to know that

“the information or guidance provided … will likely be used to enable or encourage another person to obtain, or attempt to obtain, benefits through deception”.

There seems to me a rather loose connection between the person who would be committing the offence and the actual fraud; it is a bit too remote. At the other end of the spectrum, a person would commit an offence

“if they know … that the information or guidance provided … is intended to facilitate dishonest conduct under the Social Security Administration Act 1992”.

That does not strike me as a remote connection between the person whose conduct we would be criminalising and the actual dishonest conduct, so there needs to be a bit of tightening of the subjective element, making sure that it is more narrowly focused than it currently is.

[Baroness Sherlock (Lab)]

Again, I thank noble Lords for an interesting discussion—some of it even on the amendment.

The noble Baroness, Lady Fox, is right that sickfluencers are the Opposition’s favourite topic, but it gives us an opportunity to look at this element of fraud and how the Government deal with it. I will try to take us through it. This also gives me a chance to show the way in which our legislative framework provides a comprehensive basis to enable the DWP and the PSFA to address fraudulent activity against the public sector or the social security system.

In responding to the amendments, there is something that we need to acknowledge. The noble Viscount mentioned a broad spectrum and clearly this is, particularly online. The noble Baroness, Lady Fox, made this point on a previous day in Committee: there is a lot of advice online in all kinds of settings on how to claim disability benefits, and it can range from genuine advocates for disabled people to people in similar circumstances trying to tell other people what their experience has been to friends’ or family’s online content through social media. There is all manner of guidance out there, and we need to be very careful not to drag people who are not doing anything wrong into the debate.

While many people provide advice with good intentions, irrespective of how useful the advice is or how effective it will be, there are clearly some unscrupulous people who actively try to encourage or assist others in committing fraud against the social security system. Where activity can reasonably be countered, such as taking down websites or seeking the removal of posts that are unlawful, the DWP takes relevant action. We already collaborate with a range of government partners, including Action Fraud, the City of London Police and the National Cyber Security Centre to prevent fraudulent activity online.

There are legislative duties under the Online Safety Act for social media companies to remove harmful and illegal content, including content that encourages or assists others to commit offences. The Online Safety Act also allows us to work with Ofcom and its new trusted flagger process, and we have trusted escalation routes to report social media content on certain platforms.

We are committed to demonstrating that such behaviour should not be tolerated, and we encourage anyone who identifies material online—I include the noble Viscount, Lord Younger, in this—to report it through the available channels. These people should face consequences, but there is an existing legal framework to do so. Section 7 of the Fraud Act 2006 and Section 44 of the Serious Crime Act 2007 already make it a criminal offence for individuals to provide information on how to commit fraud. That includes influencers sharing and selling information online, such as fraud instruction manuals.

In addition, we are concerned that Amendment 125A could potentially complicate the legislative landscape. Adding a new offence would create overlap with existing legislation that could lead to confusion in prosecution or sentencing, and that is entirely avoidable. It also happens that, ironically, the amendment would actually shorten the maximum sentence for those convicted of the new offence; it would carry a maximum period of five years in custody but, if the noble Baroness, Lady Fox, does not like that, the current maximum is potentially 10 years under existing legislation.

I know that the noble Viscount acknowledged previously that public sector fraud hurts everyone and that he wants to tackle it and support us in doing that. I was surprised, therefore, to read Amendment 129A, which he tabled. The amendment would prevent the use of the powers in the Bill until we publish a review assessing the impacts of people who enable others to deceive a public authority to obtain social security or welfare benefits that they are not entitled to, or to circumvent eligibility checks. I clearly cannot agree that we should prevent the PSFA or the DWP using these important new powers to tackle fraud and error until we have published such a review. During that time, we could be out there investigating fraud, tackling error and recovering public money.

I encourage the noble Viscount to reflect on what he and his Government focused on when they were in power. This focus on people who share information online or through other means may not be the “silver bullet” as he hopes. We will continue to see determined and hostile actors trying to defraud the system. It is absolutely right that the department takes action to tackle fraudulent online content and has a deterrent, but the crucial thing to remember is that fraud itself cannot take place unless those seeking to defraud the welfare system manage to interact with it. That is why we have put so much effort into protecting the social security system directly. This provides the strongest chance of success, evidenced by looking at the significant value of such activity.

I really enjoyed the contribution by the noble Baroness, Lady Fox. There is so much that I would like to push back on but I do not think that I can keep the Committee here for long enough to get into some of the issues. To take a small one, however, she thinks that this Bill is a sledgehammer to crack a nut—I think it is a pretty big nut, and we want to tackle it. We will just have to agree to disagree on that. On her broader points, this Government recognise that there are too many young people who are genuinely struggling with their mental health and who need support. We want to make sure that they get the help that they need. We also recognise that, for many people, good work is good for good health, both physical and mental. We are now in a situation where one in eight of our young people are not in education, employment or training, and we cannot allow that to carry on.

We want to get out there and support people to get into the kind of work that will be good for them, but we want to make sure that those who genuinely cannot work are able to get support. That is the direction of travel for the Government and what our reforms are meant to be about.

The noble Viscount keep asking how many people the DWP prosecutes. As he will remember, the DWP is not a prosecutor itself. The department’s role is to refer cases to the appropriate prosecuting body, the Crown Prosecution Service, which selects the most appropriate offences to prosecute under. In 2023-24, fraud investigation teams in the DWP referred around 700 prosecution cases to the CPS and Crown Procurator Fiscal in Scotland. The department does not use the term “sickfluencer” and we do not have categories for that, so I cannot tell him how many cases fall under that description. We obviously do not comment on individual cases that we refer to the relevant prosecting body.

However, I understand the points that the noble Viscount is making. We are happy to continue to work in this space but, in terms of these amendments, just proposing what is in effect a complication of the landscape and a shorter prison sentence, while preventing the DWP and PSFA from using powers in this Bill to tackle fraud and error, will not deter those criminals; it will simply enable them to keep on going. I therefore urge him to withdraw his amendment.

Public Authorities (Fraud, Error and Recovery) Bill

Lord Verdirame Excerpts

Committee stage
Monday 16th June 2025 Grand Committee

How will the promise of human intervention be exercised at the stage at which bank accounts are interrogated? That is done by an algorithm and the computer. It is only at the subsequent stage, when cases are thrown up, that there will human intervention. That is wrong; it is an extension of the state’s powers in a way that is totally unwarranted in relation to the scale of the benefits achieved by the exercise.

[Lord Verdirame (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, I agree with many of the concerns that have been expressed in connection with this group, but I will say a few words specifically in support of Amendment 79B in the names of the noble Lord, Lord Vaux, and the noble Baroness, Lady Kramer. As it stands, paragraph 1(1) in new Schedule 3B affords a very broad discretion to the Secretary of State. It says that the Secretary of State may, for the named purposes,

“give a person of a type mentioned in paragraph 2 a notice … requiring the person to take the following steps”.

On its face, this is an unfettered discretion—or, rather, it is a discretion limited only by the purpose. Other than those purposes, the discretion does not, on its face, have a limit. The power that the Secretary of State has under this clause is very broad because, on receiving those notices, the banks or financial institutions will have to take those two steps. Perhaps later we will explore the step in connection with the eligibility indicators, which is potentially quite intrusive.

It seems to me that the language proposed in the amendment would identify a standard—reasonable satisfaction—that would have to govern the exercise of this discretion. In that respect, together with a number of other amendments also proposed by the noble Lord, Lord Vaux—but particularly in the context of this power—the amendment seems extremely sensible. I urge the Government to consider it and, in due course, accept it.

[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)]

My Lords, I attached my name to the Clause 74 stand part notice tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Kramer, and Amendment 80 tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Davies. The stand part notice is a simple solution, but the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Davies, effectively, has the same impact, which is ensuring that you can investigate only when there is cause to investigate. I do not care which way it is done, but it is very clear—I associate myself with every word said by the noble Lord, Lord Davies of Brixton, here—that we are now at the sharp end of the Bill. As the noble Lord said and as I understand it, this is unprecedented in British law. This is going trawling; it is a fishing expedition and a mass intrusion. As the noble Lord said, quoting the DWP itself, it is about “‘persons unknown’ at scale”—that is an extremely telling phrase.

To put this in context, today the High Pay Centre put out its annual report on fat cat pay, which exposed what a hugely unequal society we have. It found that, on average, the top payees in organisations were getting 52 times as much as the median paid worker. The most extreme case of this that it found was the security and waste group Mitie, whose CEO was being paid 575 times the median salary of the workers. That is a comparison to the median but of course we know that many of those Mitie workers will be on the minimum wage or very near the minimum wage, and they will be in receipt of the benefits explicitly identified in the Bill. They will face their bank accounts being trawled through without their knowledge, while the CEO, with that lovely and enormously high pay level, does not face the same intrusion. This is a fundamental inequality in our society that is actively dangerous in terms of building the divisions within society.

The noble Lord, Lord Palmer, powerfully introduced the clause stand part notice, but I note his Amendment 89, which would ensure that the Bill may be used only in relation to the benefits listed in the Bill. I will not do the full Henry VIII story but, as is very obvious—it was made clear in the briefing I think we all received from the Justice organisation—with the Henry VIII powers, the Government can extend this to any other benefit. The one that immediately comes to mind, given how much it is in the headlines at the moment, is the personal independence payment—PIP—and the issues and the level of fear that already exist around that. I cannot remember the specific occasion, but I suspect that the Minister will have joined me, under the previous Government, in questioning Henry VIII clauses. This would shut the door on a Henry VIII clause, and it urgently needs to be done. I commend the noble Lord, Lord Palmer, for identifying that and putting the amendment down.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Vaux of Harrowden (CB)]

My Lords, Amendments 84 and 85 attempt to strengthen important safeguards around the use of information that is gained through an EVM. The Minister has quite rightly said that the scope of the information the banks can provide in response to an EVM is tightly limited. She is right, and that is a very significant improvement to the previous incarnation of the Bill. As currently framed, the only information that can be provided to the Secretary of State by the bank is specified details about the account, such as sort code and account number; specified details about the account holder, such as name and date of birth; and specified details about how the account meets the eligibility indicators. It is also clear in the Bill that transaction data or special category data may not be provided. So far, so good and, as I said, it is a great improvement.

But there is another important potential loophole here. Clause 72 gives the Secretary of State the power to require much more intrusive information if the Secretary of State

“has reasonable grounds to suspect that a person has committed, is committing or intends to commit a DWP offence”.

So, if the existence of an eligibility indicator alone would meet the threshold of “reasonable grounds to suspect”, then the tightly drawn restrictions on the data that banks can provide under an EVM become somewhat meaningless. It will just move on to the next phase almost automatically. We have had a lot of discussion around automation, and I agree with the noble Baroness, Lady Fox, that given the volumes of data that will be provided over time, it seems extremely likely that it will—in fact, it is extremely unlikely that it will not—be processed automatically by the DWP, which will choose which ones to investigate more deeply. We have heard about the human elements and will come on to those in the second amendment in this group. but the code of practice does not cover the transfer from EVM to Clause 72’s more intrusive data searching.

Nothing in the code of practice or the Bill would prevent this eligibility indicator being used as reasonable grounds to suspect and, therefore, the Clause 72 provision being triggered with no other safeguard. There may be many reasons why the existence of an eligibility indicator might be entirely innocent. The impact assessment and the noble Baroness have given the example of authorised disregards and genuine error—and genuine error on the part of both the individual and the department. So it seems that, before exercising the robust and intrusive powers under Clause 72, much more should be required, or at least more should be required, than just the existence of an eligibility indicator alone, and I stress “alone”. That is what Amendment 84 tries to achieve, and I think this is probably in line with what the noble Baroness intends, so I hope that this or something like it will be acceptable.

The second amendment, Amendment 85, deals with another critically important safeguard. In response to various concerns raised about the use of algorithms, algorithmic processing, the use of AI and so on, the noble Baroness has stated very clearly that information must be reviewed by a human person before action is taken, and a previous group discussed how bias and stereotyping can creep into automated systems—I will not repeat that. But again, the human element—the human review—does not appear anywhere in the Bill. There is a reference to human decision-making in paragraph 4.31 of the draft code of practice:

“No data source is perfect or infallible. That is why in fraud and error, a human will make any final decisions that affect benefit entitlement, and any indications of potential fraud or error will be looked at comprehensively”.


But this does not set out any level of seniority or qualification, and it covers only final decisions that affect benefit entitlements and not, for example, decisions to affect the intrusive investigative powers that Amendment 84 is looking at. More importantly, the code of conduct can be changed at will by the department; there is no parliamentary oversight or what have you.

As I have said before, I do not doubt the noble Baroness’s intentions in this respect, but the Bill will outlast her tenure and indeed her party’s tenure. Future Governments or Ministers may not have vulnerable people’s interests at heart in the same way that she does. Imagine a future Government applying a DOGE-style approach to this.

The requirement for any decision to be taken by a suitably qualified and senior human is such an important safeguard that I believe it must be in the Bill and not left to the whim of any future Government who might wish to simply automate the whole process—and they could do that: they just change the code of conduct. The issue is not about decisions that affect benefit entitlement alone; as I say, appropriate human review should cover also the use of the more intrusive powers under Clause 72, and the code of conduct does not cover that at all.

I am very happy to discuss the wording, but the principle of suitably qualified and senior human review before decisions are taken is, for me, one of the key safeguards. I hope the noble Baroness will be able to look sympathetically at this amendment, especially as all it does, I think, is to codify what she has consistently said will be the case. I beg to move.

[Lord Verdirame (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, I will be very brief. I very strongly support everything that the noble Lord, Lord Vaux, has said on these two amendments. They are some of the most important amendments that have been debated today because they go to a very fundamental principle. The power in Clause 72, with the new Section 109BZB, is quite significant, and we need to have limits to the exercise of this power in the Bill, both as regards the reasonable grounds—that is Amendment 84—and as regards the human decision-maker. I will not repeat the noble Lord’s reasons because I thought he put his case so compellingly, but I am very much in favour.

[Lord Palmer of Childs Hill (LD)]

My Lords, I am also pleased to welcome Amendments 84 and 85, tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Vaux of Harrowden, which serve to strengthen the safeguards within the Bill.

Amendment 84 would ensure that an authorised person must have more than just the existence of an eligibility indicator before embarking on more intrusive investigations. We believe this is a vital protection against overreach, ensuring that individuals are not subjected to unnecessary or disproportionate scrutiny based on limited evidence. Such a safeguard is entirely in keeping with my party’s principles of fairness and proportionality—that word again—and it will help to maintain public confidence in the system by ensuring that investigations are always grounded in robust evidence.

Amendment 85, which requires that information received following an eligibility verification notice is reviewed by an appropriately senior person before any changes to benefits or intrusive investigations are commenced, is equally welcome. This amendment introduces an important layer of oversight and accountability, ensuring that decisions with potentially significant consequences for individuals are not taken lightly or without proper consideration. By embedding these checks and balances into the Bill, we would be not only protecting the rights of claimants but upholding the integrity of our counterfraud efforts. I confirm other comments about how important these amendments are, and I hope that we can carry them forward to Report if need be.