National Crime Agency: Fraud and Economic Crime

Lord Browne of Ladyton Excerpts

Monday 11th September 2023 Lords Chamber

Asked by

[Lord Browne of Ladyton]

To ask His Majesty’s Government what is the total number of National Crime Agency staff dedicated to the prevention or investigation of (1) fraud, and (2) economic crime.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Home Office (Lord Sharpe of Epsom) (Con)]

My Lords, due to operational sensitivity and flexible deployment of resources in response to demand, it is not possible to provide a precise figure of staff allocated to a particular type of criminality. However, the NCA’s National Economic Crime Centre, the NECC, leads the response to economic crime, including fraud. As of 1 August 2023, the headcount for the NECC, which brings together law enforcement agencies, government departments, regulatory bodies and the private sector, was 123.5 full-time equivalent. Many other teams across the NCA also contribute to the investigation of economic crime, in addition to the NECC.

[Lord Browne of Ladyton (Lab)]

My Lords, the only way to assess the adequacy or otherwise of resources devoted to battling fraud, which was assessed last year to cost this country £219 billion, and economic crime—I understand that the Government’s own assessment is that this costs the country between £300 billion and £350 billion—is to look at the results. Will the Minister tell the House how many investigations the NCA has conducted in each of, or even one of, the last three years? How many cases of fraudsters targeting the UK from abroad have resulted in any criminal justice outcome and how many in any form of disruptive action? If he cannot do that, can he tell us how many investigations the Government expect it to conduct this year?

[Lord Sharpe of Epsom (Con)]

Significant resources are being allocated to the NECC to improve its investigatory capabilities. It will end up with an additional 400 new officers dedicated to tackling fraud; some of those will go to the NCA, some to the City of London Police and some to regional and organised crime units. They will be recruited by March 2025. There are also 475 new highly trained financial crime investigators, partly funded by the economic crime levy, who will also be spread across intelligence, enforcement and asset recovery at key agencies. I will not speculate as to their likely success, but I certainly hope they have some.